


time may change me, but i can't trace time

by abittersweetsong



Category: WTFock | Skam (Belgium)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Childhood Friends, Coming Out, Coming of Age, Fluff and Angst, Friends to Lovers, M/M, Mutual Pining, they just love each other a lot okay
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-11-29
Updated: 2021-01-14
Packaged: 2021-03-10 01:20:03
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 30,857
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27785878
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/abittersweetsong/pseuds/abittersweetsong
Summary: “You’re my best friend and I love you.”It’s a simple admission and it settles gently in Robbe’s soulOr Robbe and Sander find each other in every universe, but in this one they're best friends first
Relationships: Sander Driesen/Robbe IJzermans
Comments: 92
Kudos: 155





	1. these children that you spit on

**Author's Note:**

> happy anniversary to two boys who deserve all the love in the world  
> i love them so much and i had to get this done for their anniversary  
> i hope you like it as much as i do
> 
> i'm expecting three chapters but i can't promise it'll stay that way and don't expect updates too soon because i am a mess
> 
> a shout out to Brenna, Jenna and Em for being so encouraging  
> and especially to Morgan for being the best editor on such short notice 
> 
> here's the playlist i listened to while making this if you're into that sort of thing -https://open.spotify.com/playlist/3JRfVAhB6naeOnOmLE0UzP

**_Seven/Nine_ **

* * *

Robbe’s mother’s hand is warm in his own as they cross the street. Her thumb rubs gentle crescents over his little fist and her palm is soft. With her wrist this close to his face he can smell her perfume. _Lilac_ she tells him every time he forgets and has to ask all over again, but she never seems to mind reminding him, just smiles affectionately as he struggles to repeat the word.

Their feet crunch against the dry grass as they step off the curb. Robbe’s mama always takes him to the small playground by their church. There’s only one slide, the swings, and sandpit, but it’s hushed and there’s rarely other children there. Robbe likes it that way. He gets soft and shy in front of other kids, prefers sitting on his mamas’ knee, listening to her weave him wild stories, her voice soothing and sure or playing by himself solitary on the swing set, flying as high as he dares, creating his own adventure. His mama tells him it’s his corner of the universe.

Today the park is quiet, just birds and the buzz of insects humming in the hazy air. It’s unseasonably hot in Antwerp and the days feel long. In Robbe’s mind any time not spent outside is time wasted. His mama is happy to take him though, never gets irritated when he begs to go out and play. Sometimes she sits on a bench nearby and reads from a worn paperback, the spine cracked and folded over, or she’ll kneel beside him in the sand and help him build a castle, decorate it with sticks and leaves until they’re both satisfied.

Sweat trickles down Robbe’s neck into the collar of his shirt when they’re halfway across the park. He pulls urgently on his mama’s hand when he catches sight of the swings. She laughs, lilting and light, at his enthusiasm, releasing his hand, and he tears off across the field. The air whipping by him cools the sweat on his skin and he giggles as his body tingles with exertion. He stares at the ground as he runs. He watches the grass turn to sand beneath his feet before he looks up.

When he does, he’s startled and he pauses unsure. There’s already someone sitting on the swing set, a boy. His head is hanging towards the ground, Robbe can’t see his eyes, but his hair is brown like Robbe’s, nowhere near as long and messy, but ruffled by the breeze. He’s perched in Robbe’s preferred swing kicking his legs loosely in the air.

Robbe’s hands are tacky with sunscreen residue as he clenches and unclenches his fists nervously. He’s not sure whether to try and get the boys attention, doesn’t know how to make his voice strong and loud. The boy is taller than him, his toes closer to grazing the sand, and older too. Maybe the boy wants to be alone. Robbe understands that, he likes being alone too, but he really wants to use the swings and he doesn’t know how to communicate any of this to the boy.

He’s still weighing his options when the other boy glances up and Robbe feels the breath rush out of his tiny lungs. The boy has eyes that are made of starlight, shifting and molten in the afternoon sun. Robbe’s mind scrambles for something to compare the colour to, but the trees and grass are all too saturated, could never match how light and velvety they are. Robbe knows he’s been looking too long now, his mama says it’s rude to stare, but his tongue is tangled in mouth.

He manages to squeak a pitiful, “Hi!” and immediately looks at his feet in embarrassment.

The boy laughs, but it’s not cruel and it wavers on the air like windchimes, “Hi.”

Robbe stares at him shyly from under his lashes. He is so _pretty,_ dark eyelashes and brows, his jaw soft and sweet. Robbe’s eyes drag over his face again and again, trying to drink in him. The boy is smiling at him and he feels something warm spread across his chest.

“Do you want to use the swings?” The boy asks.

“You’re sitting in my swing.” Robbe blurts, too distracted by the boy to keep the words trapped behind his teeth.

He frowns, “Oh, I’m sorry.”

He looks downcast and Robbe’s heart clenches. He wants to take it back and wipe the frown from his face, can’t bear for this boy to be sad.

“Nonono, it’s okay I can share! We can swing together!” Robbe splutters, the words spilling haphazardly from his lips as he rushes to get them out.

The boy’s smile returns, bigger and brighter than before. It’s stunning, Robbe can’t look away. He is sure now, even more sure that this boy is made of stars, bold and wonderful.

“You’re beautiful,” Robbe says. The boy flushes gentle pink, soft and pleased. Robbe itches to touch his skin, smooth a finger over the blush and see if it feels as warm as it looks. The boy stays quiet and Robbe is worried that he’s said the wrong thing. He waits for the air to turn awkward and stiff around them, but the boy is gazing at him with easy curiosity.

“Come swing with me?” he finally asks. Robbe nods fervently, flooded with relief and clambers up into the empty seat beside him, “I’m Sander by the way.”

_Sander_. Robbe mouths the name, rolls it on his lips, it feels familiar and foreign all at once. He thinks it fits somehow, Sander, with his bright eyes and wide smile. Sander who’s made of magic.

“Robbe.”

“Well, Robbe,” his eyes twinkle, “I’m sure I can swing higher than you.”

Robbe scowls, but the effect is diminished by the giggle that slips from his mouth, “Nuh uh!”

“Okay prove it then. On three.” Sander challenges, face lit with mirth.

“Okay.”

“Een, twee, drie, go!”

Robbe loses, but he can’t find it in himself to be upset about it. Not when Sander is laughing and smiling at him like that.

+++

Sometimes, Robbe is sure he dreamed Sander up, can’t believe he gets to exist in the same universe as this boy who’s loud and free one moment, but can simmer low and quiet in the next, can make the whole room still.

He is so enamoured with Sander and it only gets worse the more he gets to know him. Robbe wants to hear every thought he’s ever had, wants to memorise every slight variation of his smile, what he looks like when he’s awake and when he’s asleep. 

Sander is _interesting,_ and all his little quirks are endearing.

He falls asleep too easily in the sun and talks out loud to himself when he watches TV. He bites the skin around his nails instead of the nails themselves. He snorts when he laughs, and he likes his drinks without ice.

Robbe just likes Sander.

+++ 

“Sander?”

“Yeah?”

“What are you doing?”

Robbe rolls over on the bed, head lolling lazily to the side, eyes tracing Sander’s back as he sits hunched over his desk a little ways across the room. The blinds are up and afternoon sunlight spills across Sander’s bedroom. Robbe focuses on a chunk of light running over Sander’s hair, chipping it gold in some places and catching on the ends.

The sight is familiar, Sander in his natural habitat. In a lot of ways Sander’s house is just as familiar as his own now. Robbe knows about the third drawer down with the missing handle in the kitchen and the two steps on the staircase that creak in tandem when you climb them. He guesses that’s the kind of stuff you learn when you spend so much time in one place and he’s happily spent the last couple of months roaming around the house with Sander. Every other day Robbe’s mother drops him off at Sander’s and Sander’s mother plies them with juice and cookies before unleashing them.

They played soccer in the backyard, kicking around in the dirt, getting permanent grass stains on their jeans. They learned to ride bikes side by side out the front of the house under Sander’s dad’s watchful eye, the sun beating down on their backs and helmets too -loose just coming down over their eyes. Sander’s mum teaches them how to make croques, both of them sharing one step stool as they buttered slices of bread. But most often, like today, they hole up in Sander’s room doing everything and nothing.

The pencil scratches against paper halt as Sander turns in his chair to look at him, “I’m drawing a picture to give to my friends on the first day back, wanna see?”

Robbe abandons his science book, tossing it carelessly to the side and shuffles off the bed. He moves to stand beside the desk, but Sander catches his elbow and moves over in his seat, making room for Robbe to sit beside him. Robbe scoots onto the chair until they’re pressed together from shoulder to hip. Sander’s jumper is soft against his arm and he blushes when he feels Sander’s socked foot bump against his own.

Sander nudges the drawing towards him, and he sits up to get a better look. There are three figures swathed in lovely navy blues and yellows. Sander’s drawings are full of movement and life, the boys in the picture are all in motion and smiley, Robbe can almost feel them.

“It’s really cool, Sander. You’re really good.” Robbe murmurs tracing a finger along the edge of the page.

“Thanks, art is my favourite subject,” he admits looking sheepish. Robbe nods, smile wide and encouraging and Sander’s grows to match. Robbe is fascinated by the crinkles around his eyes, wonders if Sander knows how they make the air lurch in his lungs. He coughs and looks back at the paper.

“Those are your friends?” he asks and Sander nods, “What are their names?”

Sander points to a blonde boy, sketched in a blue jacket, “That’s Kobe, and the one with the brown hair is Maxim, and that’s David, they’re all in my class.”

He looks fond and Robbe feels the first stirrings of jealousy deep in his stomach. He knows Sander has other friends and why wouldn’t he? Sander is fun and vibrant, bright and blinding like wildfire. He’s funny and smart and anyone who doesn’t want to be friends with Sander is an idiot in Robbe’s opinion. And he hates when Sander is sad, wants him to have friends that make him happy, but that doesn’t mean Robbe likes sharing and the idea of Sander smiling at someone else like he smiles at him and pressing close together like they are now fills Robbe with dread.

Trying to quell the rising feeling of bitterness he asks as lightly as he can, “Did you see them over break?”

He shakes his head, “No.”

“Why not?”

“I was busy hanging out with you.” Sander shrugs. “I dunno, they’re my school friends. We don’t really talk outside of school. They’re cool, but I don’t want to spend all of my time with them or anything. They’re not like you.”

“Me?”

“Yeah, you’re my best friend.” He says it so casually, like it’s the most obvious thing in the world. He’s not even looking at Robbe when he says it, he’s looking down– re-darkening the lines of Maxim’s pant leg – as though he hasn’t just nestled himself a space in Robbe’s little heart and set up permanent residence.

“ _Oh_ ,” Robbe breathes. Sander turns to him; his face is shadowed with vulnerability, his usual exuberance dampened.

“Am I your best friend?” He asks softly and Robbe wants to laugh because well how could he even ask that? Sander is his favourite person. And though Robbe has never much considered the concept of best friends how could anyone other than Sander be his? Robbe wants to be with Sander all the time, spends their days apart thinking about him and when he’s not thinking about him, he’s trying to remember stories to tell him the next time they see each other.

But Robbe feels like that’s a lot to admit so he settles for an equally quiet and honest, “Yeah.”

Sander grins all melty and Robbe thinks a comfortable silence falls between them, but he can’t be sure because there’s a hot thrumming in his ears that’s impossible to ignore.

He nudges him with his shoulder, and Robbe does everything to fight the heat burning in his cheeks. Sander reaches over and grabs a blank piece of paper from the stack on his desk and pushes it between them, “Want me to draw you?”

Robbe nods and watches as he starts scribbling out the lines of his face and collecting pencils in shades of mahogany and amber to use to colour.

With Sander beside him, their warm bodies aligned, his elbow knocking Robbe’s periodically as he draws, and watching his own smiling face appearing on the page, Robbe is sure he can’t feel any happier than this.

+++

In September Robbe starts his second year of school.

Robbe is pretty put out about the whole school thing. He doesn’t like it any more than the year before. There’s too many other kids and his teacher is boring and most importantly Sander isn’t there with him. He’d begged his mother several times to let him transfer to Sander’s school, but she refused him as kindly as she could, something about waiting lists that Robbe didn’t really understand. So, he’s resigned himself to the fact that Sander is two years older and that he goes to a different school, but that doesn’t mean he has to be happy about it.

On the first day back, he sits grumpily in his designated seat. He’s hoping to go mostly unnoticed, avoid questions from their teacher and spend the majority of the class folding paper planes. He fiddles with the nametag on the desk, picking at the edge and peeling apart the laminate. He’s nervous and fidgety despite his boredom. Robbe likes the familiar, he likes the smell of lilac, his favourite pair of dirty, well-worn sneakers, and deep green eyes.

Although he’s been at the school for one whole year already, he hasn’t even come close to meeting all the students in his grade. He’s no good with large groups of people. There’s too much noise and not enough space to contain it. He pulls at the strings of his hoodie, bunching and un-bunching the hood over and over as the classroom quickly fills with kids.

He’s already sick of today and it’s barely even begun. What use is learning grammar when they have computers anyway? He sighs, crossing his arms in front of him and dropping his chin on top. He knows some of his misery is because he misses Sander, more than he should, but he just wants to be back at Sander’s house again, playing video games, watching tv, really anything but _this_.

A small dark-haired boy drops suddenly into the chair next to him and Robbe jumps, tearing the corner of his name tag off in surprise. He looks as bored as Robbe feels. ‘Jens’ his own nametag reads.

Jens is nice. Robbe finds himself comfortable and at ease in a way he isn’t around other kids. He strikes up a conversation with Robbe about sports teams and cartoons and the best way to fold paper planes so that they go the farthest distance. They’re gleeful as they tear their worksheets apart folding little wings and chucking them at unsuspecting students.

They get in trouble of course. Their teacher attempts to lecture them on their behaviour, but every time they make eye contact, they burst into giggles and her voice strains to a yell and her neck flushes red in anger.

They both grumble about the lunch time detention they receive as punishment, but Jens stays by his side on the walk to the playground at recess and every day after that, so he doesn’t think it was much of a loss.

+++

Robbe likes Jens a lot. Jens wants to learn to ride a skateboard and he always brings Robbe an extra bonbon in his lunchbox. Jens is cool, but Sander is his best friend.

Robbe had vaguely imagined the two of them meeting at some point, but he never really thought it out too much. It’s not like they don’t know of each other’s existence, he’s talked about Jens to Sander when they’ve discussed school and their friends, and he knows he talks about Sander all the time, so Jens is well aware of him.

But despite all that he doesn’t know if they’ll get along, they’re just different and Robbe isn’t sure what he would do if they didn’t like each other. Would he have to split his time between them? Reserve school time for Jens and after school for Sander with no overlap? It’s too stressful for his seven-year-old brain to think about. In the end fate decides they’ll meet before Robbe does. 

He and Jens are strolling out of the school gates, rolling their bikes along beside them, when he hears a cheerful, “Hey!”

He looks up and breaks into a smile when he sees Sander walking towards him, backpack swinging off one shoulder. He ditches his bike quickly against a wall.

“Sander!” Robbe throws his arms around him and Sander lifts him off the ground as he hugs him back, “What are you doing here?”

Sander sets him back on the pavement, “Wanted to see you,” He glances behind Robbe and deflates a little, “Unless you’re busy?”

Robbe looks back and sees Jens standing off to the side kicking at the ground, pretending not to be listening. He tugs Sander towards him by the sleeve of his jacket.

“Oh, Jens this is Sander.”

Sander gives him a half wave, “Hi.”

Jens smirks, “Hey, cool to meet you, Robbe never shuts up about you.”

Robbe glares at Jens, but knows his face is quickly turning scarlet.

“Robin!” Sander coos, unable to hold back his laugh “You talk about me?”

Robbe rolls his eyes, shoving Sander in the shoulder, “You’re my best friend of course I talk about you, idiot.”

“Idiot? That’s not how you talk to your best friend.” Sander scolds, laughter still slipping between his words.

To Robbe’s dismay Jens quickly jumps in, an unhealthy amount of smugness in his tone, “Yeah _Robin_ , that’s just not very nice.”

Robbe scoffs and looks between the two of them in exasperation, can’t believe he ever considered them not getting along, “Both of you shut up.”

Their shared laughter bounces down the street and Robbe stamps his foot in annoyance. He should’ve known they would’ve united to make fun of him. Sander decides to take pity on him, he throws an arm around his shoulders, and addresses Jens, “I was just gonna ask Robbe if he wanted to do something this afternoon, you wanna come?”

Jens looks between them for a moment an unreadable expression on his face. Robbe wants to shirk away from it, hide in Sander’s shoulder, but he resists. Then Jens shakes his head, his face clears and he’s grinning as he agrees, “Yeah sure.”

Robbe’s body releases tension he didn’t realise he was holding and that confuses him. He leans over and grabs his bike and the three of them set off down the street.

They stop first at a frietkot, Sander has pocket money, and he buys them all sodas and a bucket of fries to share. They slather the fries in mayonnaise and between the three of them manage to scarf it down in an alarmingly short amount of time.

Afterwards they sit and enjoy the brief flash of sunshine on an otherwise cold autumn day. Sander entertains them with stories from his school, gesticulating wildly as he retells some incident involving his teacher and a rogue bee and Jens laughs along at all the right moments. Robbe just listens, looks between them, content.

When Jens gets up to use the bathroom, Sander turns to him, eyes concerned. He puts a hand on Robbe’s wrist rubbing his thumb over the skin there, “You okay? You’re being quiet today.”

Robbe just smiles, small and open, warmth settling in his stomach, “Yeah I’m okay, just happy.”

Sander’s face softens and he gazes at Robbe with blatant tenderness, and a wave of affection rolls through him.

“Good.” Sander says.

“Good.” Robbe mouths back.

Jens comes back and breaks the delicate mood between them, and they all collect their things and start the journey home. The ride back is slow because they keep trying to shove each other over, stopping to look at weird plants sprouting next to the footpath and just generally dragging it out, all three of them unwilling for the afternoon to end.

Sander parts with them early, heading to his house further away. Robbe and Jens are fairly quiet as they bike home together. It’s not uncomfortable, but it’s unusually heavy. 

Jens breaks it first, as they come to a stop at the street where they normally part ways and head to their individual homes, “Sander’s awesome,” he admits.

“Really?” Robbe asks, trying to tame his rising enthusiasm.

Jens nods, “Yeah, we should all hang out again.”

Robbe’s smile could split his face in two, “Okay.”

+++

Robbe’s mama acts strange.

He catches her sometimes talking fast and urgent to the air.

Panic will seize in his gut, this overwhelming feeling of wrongness that he can’t shake. He’ll call her name, voice shaking slightly and reach out to put a hand on her shoulder.

But then she’ll turn around and smile call him honey, run a delicate hand through his hair and he’ll be sure he imagined the whole thing.

+++

One night Robbe and Sander decide to set up a tent in Sander’s backyard and camp out under the stars.

It feels thrilling and grown up, the two of them alone under the dark arching sky, though he knows Sander’s parents are sleeping just inside.

He can hear the chirp of crickets from outside the tent and that general night-time hum that helps soothe him to sleep. But now there’s something added, something better: the shift of Sander beside him in his sleeping bag and the careful rhythm of his breathing.

He knows Sander is awake without having to look, can feel his mind running. They’re both staring up through the little open square in the roof of the tent, at the few stars visible between the mesh and unobscured by city smog.

It’s special in the way hidden things are, like this sliver of sky is theirs for private viewing despite the fact that there could be millions of other people staring at the same stars. Sander breathes deeply beside him, but it’s relaxed and full.

“They’re beautiful, aren’t they?” Sander whispers.

Robbe looks at him through the darkness and knows that even without seeing them, Sander’s eyes are filled with the same stars.

“Yeah, they are.”

+++

**_Eleven/Thirteen_ **

* * *

Robbe is touchy. He’s always been that way, it’s how he gives and receives comfort, with the touch of a hand or a tight hug. He’s never paid any attention to it and Sander is the same, so they hug, and they sit with legs overlapping and hands touching. It’s their thing, just the way they are.

Sander clutches tightly to his hands as he wobbles back on the skateboard. Robbe and Jens had dragged Sander to the skatepark against his will. They practiced dropping in while Sander sat at the edge of the bowl and cheered them on. It’s past three-thirty on a Thursday and the park is unnaturally empty so Robbe was able to pester Sander into having a turn without the threat of public humiliation hanging over his head.

“Robbe, this thing is a death-trap.”

Robbe chuckles, “No it’s not you just have shit balance.”

“Will you catch me if I fall?” Sander’s smile is lopsided and cheeky. Robbe hates the way he melts a bit, even though the line is so fucking cheesy he should’ve shoved him straight off.

He scoffs to hide his grin, “Shut up.”

Sander huffs, but his concentration slips, and he sways again, grabbing Robbe tighter, “Okay I’m done, this sucks, let me down.”

Robbe rolls his eyes but helps him step off the board. Sander makes a huge show of getting down on his knees and hugging the ground, even presses his lips quickly against the concrete.

Robbe snickers, kicking him lightly with his foot, “You’re so dramatic.”

“You love me.”

“Sure, whatever you want to believe,” Robbe replies and quickly steps onto Sander’s abandoned board and takes off with Sander running after him. Robbe giggles as he swivels in easy, practiced circles around him. 

Jens rolls towards them on his own skateboard, smirking, “Given up already Sander?”

Sander looks nonplussed, “Jens all you can do is roll around and pick up, you’re not exactly Tony Hawk.”

“Fuck off, I can do more than that!” Jen scowls and Robbe has to cough to cover his laughter.

“No you can’t,” Robbe smirks.

“Whatever,” Jens mutters, kicking his board up petulantly. 

“Anyway,” Sander says, “I’ve gotta head home, Mum wanted me to help clean the house before dinner.”

“Laaaame.” Jens drawls and Sander flips him off faster than Robbe thought possible. 

He turns to Robbe instead, eyes questioning, “I’ll see you tomorrow?”

Robbe knows he has homework and that his dad is already mad at him for not doing the dishes and that he hasn’t had dinner at home in three days but there’s still zero hesitation when he replies, “Yeah of course.”

Sander’s returning smile is lovelier than all the stars in the night sky.

He hugs him goodbye as he leaves. It’s a good hug, Sander wraps him up and lets it linger. They drag away from each other slowly, their hands touching until the very last moment before Sander wishes him a last goodbye and walks away.

Robbe watches him leave, eyes trailing after him as he gets smaller and smaller on the horizon.

He walks back to the bowl with a sigh once Sander dips out of sight, and joins Jens, sitting down heavily beside him on the ledge, heels kicking at the slope.

“Why do you guys always do that?” Jens asks out of nowhere.

Robbe jumps at his voice and then furrows his brow, confused, “Do what?”

“You guys hug all the time or are like touching,” Jens remarks. He doesn’t seem concerned or weirded out, just curious and Robbe doesn’t know what that means, but it sets him on edge, and he doesn’t know why.

He shrugs, though his heart is hammering painfully between his ribs, “I don’t know we just do. He’s my best friend.”

Jens thinks for a second and then raises his shoulder in acceptance and lets the issue drop, “Okay.”

Robbe’s heart slows, but his mind doesn’t.

He and Jens try to practice tricks for another half an hour or so but Robbe’s brain isn’t cooperating. He keeps fucking up because he’s not paying close enough attention and ends up with half-a-dozen bruises streaked across his shins.

He is still thinking about Jen’s questions days later when he’s lying on Sander’s bed next to him, their ankles crossed over each other as they balance Sander’s laptop across their thighs. 

Robbe hasn’t been paying attention for a while, doesn’t notice when one video changes to another. He’s too distracted, hyperaware of everywhere he and Sander are connected, swears he can feel static buzzing between their skin.

“Do you think we touch too much?”

“What?” Sander pauses the video and sits up, looking bewildered. Robbe cringes internally for bringing it up so suddenly and out of the blue, but he can’t backtrack now.

“I dunno.” Robbe mumbles, “We hug more than other kids and stuff.”

He looks down at his lap in embarrassment, picking anxiously at the bed spread. He’s upset with himself for letting it get to him so much. Robbe doesn’t _think_ Jens meant anything by it, didn’t seem too concerned or really even imply anything but in Robbe’s mind everything has changed now. He’s been singled out; he’s done something worth notice and that makes him different. He hates it, wants to do everything he can to fade into the background again, wants to be _normal_. But he doesn’t want to admit any of that to Sander and see his face fall.

Sander pauses, foot shifting as he thinks. Robbe feels anxiety welling up in him the longer he takes.

“Does hugging me make you happy?” he asks finally.

Robbe knows the answer, knows it deep inside him, like he knows how to breathe, “Yes.”

Sander reaches over and wraps his hand around Robbe’s forearm, thumbing over the downy skin of his wrist. Robbe swallows back the appreciative hum itching to leave his throat and hopes Sander doesn’t feel the way his pulse picks up under his fingers.

“And that,” Sander meets his eyes, intense and unassuming at the same time,” Does that feel nice?”

“Yes,” Robbe breathes.

Sander smiles and releases his arm, “Then it’s okay.”

“Yeah?”

Sander nods firmly, gaze unwavering, “Yes.”

Robbe looks at him for another minute and then slumps down, resting his cheek against Sander’s shoulder and waits for him to restart the video.

Sander clicks play and returns his hand to Robbe’s arm, stroking up and down absently. Robbe knows his insecurities are sure to return, but right now, sleepy and with Sander warm beneath his cheek, he doesn’t really care.

+++

His mother drags him to church for the Sunday morning service. Her voice too fast and her movements erratic as she pulls him out of bed and wrenches button-down shirts from their hangers in his closet.

The inside of the church is colder than Robbe’s ever felt and he doesn’t understand how his mother is walking around in her sleeveless dress while he shudders in his long-sleeved shirt and trousers.

He grimaces as she steers him from parishioner to parishioner, talking just too quickly, chapters and verses spilling from her lips. They look confused and slightly concerned and Robbe knows he must look the same, but he doesn’t know what else to do other than let himself be paraded around and hope that it makes her happy enough to stop.

She settles him onto of the long wooden benches when the sermon begins, right near the front. His spine rubs raw against the back of the pew. His mother rocks back and forth next to him, murmuring an unintelligible string of prayers. Robbe swallows thickly and tries not to hear her, but the only other thing to listen to is the priest, his deep voice echoing across the church, harsh and strong. The word abomination rings in Robbe’s ears and tears sit unshed in his eyes, as he waits for it to be over.

He tries not to think of Sander and the way his stomach swoops to his knees when he does.

He never goes to church again.

His mother stays in bed for a week.

His father pretends everything is fine.

+++

When Sander works out he can climb in through Robbe’s bedroom window, all bets are off. He makes a habit of it, doing it so often that Robbe isn’t even scared anymore when he comes back from the bathroom to find Sander already waiting on his bed. Robbe’s parents don’t even bat an eye anymore when Sander shows up in their kitchen without ever having been invited through the front door.

During the day, he’ll stumble through, eager to tell Robbe about some new game he wants to buy, or how hungry he is and drag Robbe out with him on whatever endeavour he decided on that day.

But when Sander comes through at night, well that’s Robbe’s favourite. Robbe will hear the lightest of taps on the glass and shuffle out of bed in his socks to the window to undo the latch and let him in.

They curl up next to each other In Robbe’s bed, legs locked around each other. Robbe listens as Sander’s voice drifts across the sheets to him, “Yeah and David has the biggest crush on Emma, it’s so obvious, but he won’t admit it, says they’re just friends.”

“What if they are just friends? What if he doesn’t like her like that?”

Sander scrunches his nose, “Maybe, but I think you know when you really _like_ someone.”

“Well how do you know when you like someone?”

Sander rolls onto his back to look at the ceiling. He bites his lip, searching for the right words, “It’s like your chest feels relaxed and tight at the same time, like you’re losing breath _and_ sucking it in. And when you can remember their voice and their face when they smile perfectly even when they’re not there. Or when you see them and nothing else seems important anymore, you can’t remember any of the things you’re supposed to do. That’s what it’s like.”

“Really?” Robbe says and Sander nods still staring at the roof.

He doesn’t know what he expected, but it’s not that. For Robbe romance has always been some grand concept, some huge untouchable thing that only adults really understand, it’s not supposed to be that simple. But Sander never lies to him and Sander never talks down to him or makes things simpler for him to understand.

“How do _you_ know?” Robbe asks.

Sander turns back over and their eyes lock. Sander’s eyes move over his face, trailing over his cheeks and down his jaw. Each place he looks burns.

“I had a crush on this girl in my class a little while ago,” he admits.

Something inside Robbe fractures, slides out of place and starts jutting painfully into his chest. His head feels too full suddenly, it’s like his brain is trying to weave together a thousand thoughts, but his mind just won’t stop racing and he can’t keep up.

“Oh,” his voice is small, “Why didn’t you tell me?”

Sander closes his eyes, his face slack and relaxed, “It wasn’t a big deal, it wasn’t like I loved her or anything and I don’t like her anymore.”

Robbe carefully inches towards Sander the smallest amount, but enough that he can see the shadows his eyelashes cast on his cheeks and hear his low breaths.

“And?” Robbe’s whisper is so quiet he’s not even sure Sander will hear, “How do you know if it’s love?”

Sander parts his lips and breathes out through his mouth, the last remnants of heat dust over Robbe’s nose. His eyes open and Robbe freezes.

“You just know.”

Robbe doesn’t know when they look away from each other, when his eyes slip closed and he falls asleep, but when he opens them again morning light is careening through the window and Sander is gone, his side of the bed still warm.

+++

Robbe’s thighs are burning from how long they’ve been cycling. He hasn’t seen a car for ages, and he has no idea how far from the city they are now.

Sander seems to have no such concerns, singing loudly at the top of his voice as he weaves along the road.

While Robbe is contemplating how long he can keep this up before his legs give out, Sander brakes and comes to a quick stop, the soles of his shoes making a gravelly sound as they scrape along the road.

He gets off and starts leading his bike off the side of the road without so much as a look back and Robbe has no choice but to follow him.

“Sander, where are we going?”

“Look,” Sander points to an opening in the fence line, smile wide, “It’s basically begging us to go in.”

Robbe looks out past the fence and sees nothing but overgrown green grass, stretching on for kilometres. There’s not even flowers or trees, but Sander is already ducking through the gap and Robbe goes after him whining under his breath.

Sander strides into the middle of the grass and flops back, splaying out with his eyes already closed.

Robbe looks around, deeply unimpressed, “Sander it’s an empty field, it’s boring.”

Sander opens one eye to look at him, “You know Robbe there’s this thing called talking, people have been doing it for thousands of years, it’s quite good for passing the time.”

“Piss off,” Robbe grumbles. Sander laughs.

“Just come and lay down here with me.”

Robbe sighs, but does as he’s told, laying down next to him, the sleeves of their jackets scratching together as he shifts into place. The grass tickles around his ears, but his beanie stops it from really itching so he doesn’t mind.

“So,” Robbe muses, “What are we talking about?”

“Hmmm let’s play a game.”

“Okay.”

“Okay you tell me one truth and then I tell you one, until one of us can’t think of one anymore.”

“That’s not a game!”

“Yes, it is! I just made it one.”

Robbe huffs out a laugh, but concedes, “Fine.”

He follows a cloud crossing slowly across the sky as he thinks of his first answer.

“My legs hurt and I don’t want to ride back.”

Sander lets out a full belly laugh and it’s stark and loud in the crisp air.

“I’d let you ride on the back of mine, but you don’t want to leave yours behind hmm?”

Robbe leans over and flicks him in the ear. “Shut up, it’s your turn. Or have you already given up?”

Sander bats his hand away. “No! Um,” he pauses unsure, “I’m scared about high school, growing up all that stuff. I want everything to stay like it is now.”

It’s a serious answer and Robbe feels the mood shift.

“I’m scared about that, too.”

Sander turns his head towards him, “You stole my answer.”

“You didn’t say I couldn’t.”

“Rude,” he says, but he’s smiling, so Robbe doesn’t feel bad about it.

He sobers as he thinks of his next answer, wanting to match Sander’s honesty. “I think something is wrong with my parents, but I don’t know what.”

It’s an understatement, but he can’t think of any other way to put it because it’s the truth. He has no idea what’s going on, but his mother disappears into her room for days and his father comes to and from work with a plastered-on smile and a lot of excuses.

Robbe feels Sander move. He brushes their palms together carefully, giving Robbe time to tear his hand away, but he doesn’t, never would. He curls their fingers together grasping Robbe’s hand firm and sure. Robbe wonders if Sander can tell he’s shaking.

“You’re my best friend and I love you.” It’s a simple admission and it settles gently in Robbe’s soul. Sander’s never said those words before, in that order, in that voice and Robbe knows he means them.

“I can’t think of one,” Robbe whispers.

“Ik win.” Equally soft.

Their hands stay joined.

They don’t make it home until the sun is already dipping below the horizon and they get a stern scolding from their parents, but when he goes to sleep that night Robbe can still feel Sander’s hand clutched tightly in his.

+++

**_Thirteen/Fifteen_ **

* * *

They’re yelling again.

His parents are screaming at each other and the sound is barrelling through the walls 

He just needs to block them out for a little longer, but his headphones are doing next to nothing to cover the screams from the kitchen. He scratches out another incorrect answer and sighs. The numbers are all merging together, he can’t even remember what topic he’s doing. He tries to start again, reads the opening sentence over and over, not once taking the words in.

Robbe just needed them not to do this for one day, _one_ day. He needed one afternoon where he could just sit at his desk and do his homework in peace and pretend that everything is fine. He should have known better, can’t believe he even let himself hope. He’s startled by a particularly loud shout and his hand slips on the page, a jagged pen line slicing across the paper.

For the most part though it’s familiar now, the shouting. Robbe expects it, is on edge until it begins. He has memorised the particular way his mum’s voice strains right before she starts screaming. It makes him sick, the relief he feels when the yelling finally starts because at least he can stop holding his breath waiting for it. All their fights blur into one endless argument that always begins with raised voices and ends with the front door slamming as his dad storms out of it and Robbe doing his best to ignore his mother’s empty gaze as he helps her to bed. When he feels like torturing himself, he’ll try and remember the months before the fighting became a regular occurrence. All his mind can grasp are snippets of quiet evenings, his mum at the stove humming to herself and his dad in the living room laughing at the TV, but each memory is tinged in fuzz as if it could fade away at any moment like the setting sun and Robbe can’t quite be sure that they happened at all.

Tears build in his eyes. His music is up so loud it hurts his ears, but he can still hear his parents, can’t stop himself from seeking out their voices in the ruckus. There’s just too much fucking noise, in the house, in his ears, stacking up and up, pressing hard against the side of his brain until he can’t hear, can’t _think_.

He wrenches his headphones off, throws them to the floor. They clatter against the hardwood _NWA_ still spilling from the speakers. Without the headphones Robbe can hear them viciously clear. His mum sounds hysterical and his dad is frustrated and unforgiving as he shouts over her. It’s ugly, they’ve never sounded so bitter, so cracked. Robbe tastes acid in his mouth. It’s up to him to hold them together. He’s thirteen and he has no fucking clue what he’s doing, but it’s up to him. They’re his parents, they’re supposed to look after him and hold him when he cries and help him with his homework. Robbe can’t fix this, but he’s trying, he’s trying so hard. He keeps up with his schoolwork, does all his chores without being asked, cooks himself dinner without complaint when his mum can’t get up and his dad isn’t around. Robbe just has to keep it up and everything will work out, his dad will finally take control, they’ll get his mum help and then they’ll be a family again. He just has to keep trying.

The yelling reaches its peak. Robbe hears the crack of something hitting the kitchen tiles and the wail his mum lets out pierces through the air. Robbe’s heart sticks in his throat. There’s shuffling and his father’s heavy footfalls. The front door bangs as it’s thrown closed and then everything is still.

Robbe’s limbs feel heavy as lead. He reaches for his door handle, easing it open and stepping out into the hallway. He’s scared of what he’ll find, keeps picturing his mother’s blood spotted garish red against the tiles. He shivers and pulls his shirt closer to his body.

He pads softly into the kitchen. There’s almost no sound, only the low buzz of the fridge and choked crying. One of their bar chairs has been knocked to the floor and is laying pathetically on its side the wooden back split down the middle. Robbe swallows and steps around the counter. His mum is curled up against the cabinets, her body is shuddering with sobs. Robbe steps forward slowly and sinks to his knees beside her.

She looks so small like this, folded in on herself until she’s barely there. Rage flares through Robbe, hot and fast. He hates his father in that moment. He can’t believe his dad let it get this far, that he’s letting his mother go on suffering like this, that he keeps screaming at her and makes her cower and crumble and then leaves her behind for Robbe to piece back together.

Robbe doesn’t want to startle her, doesn’t want to make it worse. He reaches out carefully and runs a hand along her arm, “Mama?”

She shifts at his touch and the curtain of her hair falls away. Her eyes are pearly with tears, but she’s looking at him and not through him, so he counts that as a small victory. Robbe gives her a tentative smile and her lip wobbles, fresh tears collecting at her waterline. It’s heartbreaking, but so vibrant such a contrast from how empty her eyes have been in recent months. Robbe’s chest aches for her. He shushes her gently, rubs her back to soothe her, “It’s okay Mama, let me take you to bed.”

Her tears still escape, but she manages to nod jerkily. Robbe stands and hooks his hand under her arm pit, the other hand still supporting her back. He tugs her up as kindly as he can and pulls her to her feet. He can feel the cold of the tiles seeping through his socks. She rests heavily against him as he half-leads half-carries her out of the kitchen.

Her crying slows to hitched sniffles and each aborted breath rings out like a shot, bouncing violently off the bare walls. Robbe nudges his parents’ bedroom door open with a hip, guiding his mother inside. 

The air is stale, it makes the back of his throat dry. There’s a fine sliver of light cutting through where the curtains don’t quite meet. In the dim light he can make out a couple of bowls on the nightstand, containing half eaten food presumably made by his father and picked at by his mother. At least there’s some proof his dad is trying. Robbe sighs and swallows against the sudden thickness in his throat.

He leads his mum over to the bed and sits her down on the edge. He touches her knee lightly to prompt her to swing her legs up onto the bed and lie down. It takes a second, but she does so slowly and then crumples against the sheets, all energy draining out of her, spilling off the side of the bed and running between the cracks in the floorboards. Robbe leans over her and drags the comforter over her body. His father’s side of the bed is unrumpled. He isn’t sure of the last time his dad slept there, Robbe wonders if the imprint of his body is still pressed into the mattress.

He turns to leave but his mother’s voice croaks out in the silence, “I’m sorry engel.”

He makes his way back to the bed and wraps his arms around her, his nose pressed into her neck where the last hint of something floral lingers.

“It’s okay Mama, I love you,” he whispers. He runs a hand through her hair once, twice before getting up. Her eyes are closed and breathing even; he hopes her sleep is dreamless. Robbe slips out as quietly as he can. The silence in the hallway greets him like an old friend. 

The walk back to his own room feels immeasurably long and lonely. His eyes catch on the family photos along the walls, images of his parents with their arms wrapped around each other, pictures of himself laughing and squirming between them. They feel like a lie. Robbe notices the itch of tears behind his eyes and his chest is filled with an insurmountable ache that he cannot place. He’s an unbearable mess of feelings, love and despair for his mother, the growing anger at his father and an overwhelming sense of fear that surges up his throat and threatens to choke him. He feels so fucking helpless and out of control. He can’t _do_ this. He’s thirteen years old and he’s scared shitless. He can’t give his mother the help she needs, but his father clearly isn’t going to do anything. The whole situation is fucked, and they all know it, but they’re all trapped in this limbo, never moving forward.

He can hear his breathing pick up, but he’s barely aware of it, it sounds so far away. He’s watching himself open his bedroom door and stumble inside. The air inside his room isn’t any easier to breathe and his chest is so fucking tight. Everything feels so separate his body and his brain and his thoughts which are spiralling so fast he’s having trouble keeping up with his own panic. His hands creep up to his temples and grip furiously in his hair and he tugs and tugs until his scalp is aching. He can’t breathe, he needs to get out, but he has nowhere to go and he’s alone, he’s so alone he can’t bear it. There’s just him and the desperation crawling its way up his spine.

Suddenly there’s a cracking sound on his left and Robbe’s heart stops in his chest. His eyes fly to where the sound came from and his body spikes hot to cold and back again. He catches a glimpse of brown hair and wide green eyes and everything in him begins to unclench. Sander is at the window, perched on the outside ledge. Robbe returns to his own body, becomes aware of his feet touching the floor and feeling returns to each of his limbs one by one. He knows his breathing is still too fast to be considered normal, but he’s got a hold on it for now. His hands are a little shaky as he walks to the window and shoves it open.

Sander immediately clambers ungracefully inside almost falling when his shoe catches on the frame. He rights himself and looks up with a grin. It falls when he sees whatever look is on Robbe’s face. His brow furrows in worry and he takes a tentative step towards him.

“Robbe? Are you okay?”

Robbe chokes on a laugh, but it’s watery and there’s a hotness on his cheeks that tells him he’s crying. Sander closes the distance between them in two strides and then Robbe is engulfed in his arms. Robbe lets out a pathetic sound and then he’s sobbing into Sander’s shoulder, hands fisted in the back of his t-shirt. No one hugs like Sander does, all over and so tight like he wants to merge you into his body. He’s ashamed of how greedy he feels, how much he wants Sander to swallow him up to clutch him until it’s bordering on hurt. Sander is here and he’s real and solid and warm. Robbe breathes him in, the smell of sweat and spice and boy.

Sander rocks them back and forth oblivious to the tornado whirling through Robbe’s mind. Robbe tries to pull back, but Sander only lets him lean away slightly, won’t release him from his grip. Robbe can’t help but smile at his clinginess, but it’s weak. He can feel the self-consciousness creeping in.

“Sorry,” Robbe mutters, refusing to meet Sander’s eyes.

Sander sighs, affectionate, “Robbe what have I said about saying sorry.”

Robbe murmurs an apology again anyway just to feel Sander’s chuckle rumble against him.

When the silence drags on too long Sander asks, “Do you want to talk about it?”

Robbe shakes his head, his face crumbling. Sander pulls him back into the circle of his arms and runs a careful hand across his shoulders as Robbe shudders, fighting off a wave of fresh tears. He feels small and out of control, like a child much younger than himself. He hates it. He doesn’t want Sander to have to comfort him. He should be out making plans with his friends for the summer, getting up to no good, and instead he’s just standing in Robbe’s bedroom worrying about him. Robbe hates himself for being so needy.

Pulling him from his self-loathing, Sander drags a hand through the hair at the back of his neck, trails it down to his nape, inadvertently brushing against his necklace. Sander leans back to look, hooks a finger in the gold chain, nail dragging across Robbe’s collarbone, making the skin there tingle.

He tugs the pendant out from under Robbe’s t-shirt, circling the warm metal with his thumb. It flares stunning and bright, the cherub bathed in fire as the light glances off it, Sander’s fingers angling it this way and that. 

Sander doesn’t say anything, but he keeps playing with the pendant, rubbing it against Robbe’s sternum. It’s soothing in the best way, but Robbe isn’t ready to admit anything or everything so he just lets Sander keep going.

They don’t move for a long time.

+++

Robbe doesn’t think Sander has ever gotten them anywhere on time, but today is the exception.

He had been so excited about taking Robbe to the museum that he hadn’t even let them have their usual banter on the bike ride there. There was nothing but the click of their wheels and the wind rushing past their ears.

Sander draws constantly, carries a notepad around all the time, rests it on his knees and clutches a thoroughly chewed pencil. He draws random objects, makes Robbe (and sometimes against his will, Jens) stop to sketch random landscapes they cycle through. Mostly he draws Robbe. He draws Robbe mid-laugh as he tells some story. He sketches the way the sun sets the ends of Robbe’s hair alight. He draws Robbe with his eyes closed, face slack with unexpected sleep.

But still Sander wants more. He’s always taking photos of the street art they pass closer to the city centre, making Robbe take notice of the hidden colours and shapes splashed across the walls of the city. Sander likes art and Robbe likes Sander, so he lets Sander drag him this way and that. He’d look at a thousand paintings if he asked him to.

So when Sander tells him about the new art exhibition at M HKA he wants to see, Robbe goes.

Sander is practically vibrating with excitement as they give up their bags at the entrance and get their visitors passes. But the second they step into the actual hall, all huge white walls and sculptures of glass and twisted metal he calms.

His whole body just relaxes, like he’s home. The way he looks changes too. Sander is normally full of energy, there’s never enough for his eyes to see, he’s always moving, eyes flitting this way and that. But here he roams, so careful in his consideration of each piece, dragging over it until he’s seen every inch.

Robbe listens to him as he explains each piece, talks about the symbolism and the use of colour and shade and a thousand other things Robbe doesn’t understand, but Sander is so unbelievably beautiful here and he can't stop looking at him.

A part of Robbe is scared, because Sander is an artist in every sense, he sees beauty in everyone and everything. And he’s going to the arts high school to be with hundreds of other people like him and Robbe can’t help but wonder where he fits.

He thinks that Sander is wonderful and that everyone he meets will realise it too, and he isn’t sure how he’ll deal without him when someone inevitably steals him away. And Robbe won’t even be able to blame them.

“It’s so amazing,” Sander says turning in a circle on the spot to take in the whole room, but then he throws a smirk over his shoulder, “All these paintings in all these different styles all here because some rich old guy decided they were worth seeing.”

Robbe laughs, but then he softens, and he can’t help but tell him, “You’ll end up in here someday.”

Sander glances around the room eyes settling on each huge frame and each sculpture. His eyes glint with mischief, “I think you mean _you’ll_ end up in here someday.”

“What?”

“You’re my muse Robbe. It’s a picture of you that’ll end up here, all my best work is of you.” He’s still smirking, but his gaze is heavy and searching in a way that makes Robbe squirm.

Robbe blushes and looks down at his sneakers, scuffing them against the tile, “Fuck off.”

“I won’t forget you when I’m famous,” Sander teases unaware of his earlier thoughts. Robbe’s retort catches in his throat.

“I hope not.” He winces at how timid he sounds, the fear just making itself known.

Sander’s reply rings clear in the open space, and when Robbe glances up at him his expression can’t be described as anything other than sweet.

“Never.”

+++

At Christmas Sander’s parents buy him his first camera.

He spends the whole next week taking pictures of everything he can find.

Robbe stubbornly refuses to be in any photos, but Sander wheedles and pouts and finally on Saturday night he gives in.

He tucks under his chin as Sander turns the camera on them, but at the last second, he looks up and breaks into a tender smile at the sight of Sander, eyes wide and happy as he stares down the camera lens.

He finds the photos of them taped up over Sander’s bed the next week.

Robbe can’t give a name to the look in his eyes, but he knows it means more than he could ever say.

The warm feeling doesn’t leave him for the rest of the day.

+++

A remote is digging into Robbe’s side, but he can’t be bothered to move from his position spread out on the couch.

“Sanderrrrr do we have to? We’ve watched a movie like three times this week.”

Sander gives him a look, “Robbe it’s raining outside, we have nothing better to do, just shut up and help me pick a movie.”

Robbe huffs but gets up off the couch to look at the DVDs in Sander’s hands.

There’s some comedy movie that looks generic and boring, an animated film that Robbe knows Sander has already seen and-

His eyes catch on the DVD case. There’s two people embracing on the front, surrounded by a pyre of golden candles. His eyes follow the line of the wings on the girls back, innocent and lovely. There’s an intimacy in their embrace that Robbe can’t look away from and he points at the case without ever really deciding to.

“That one.”

Sander furrows his brow at him, not judgemental, but uncertain, “You sure?”

Robbe nods before he can change his mind, “Yeah.”

Robbe returns to his place on the couch and waits for Sander to put the disc in and turn the lights off.

Sander sits close to him, their arms just barely grazing each other and Robbe feels weighed down in his seat, like gravity is pulling them down and toward each other. Robbe tingles in all the place they don’t touch.

The film opens in darkness and static before exploding into a vision of sound and colour. And Robbe forgets where they are and forgets everything else too.

It’s only when Sander leans in, breath hot against his ear as they watch the two lovers meet through polished glass, that Robbe remembers where he is.

“What do you think?” Sander says.

Robbe knows his voice cracks when he replies, “It’s fucking beautiful,” but Sander doesn’t laugh.

He can feel his eyes on the side of his face after that, but he loves the film too much and is too afraid to turn and meet his gaze.

And if Sander notices his eyes linger on Romeo a little too long, he doesn’t say a word.

+++


	2. but still the days seem the same

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> it took a long ass time but here's the next chapter and yes this is now four chapters sdjadjkd
> 
> // some trigger warnings
> 
> there is some casual homophobia at one point in this chapter 
> 
> also a depressive episode 
> 
> //
> 
> i hope you like it
> 
> i dedicate this chapter and honestly this whole fucking thing to Morgan @cryingcancer on ao3 who's a great writer and a wonderful person, who puts up with all my pedantic questions, my terrible grammar and a thousand other things. i would never feel as confident about this work without you 💙
> 
> leave a comment they're better than christmas presents

**_Fourteen/Sixteen_ **

* * *

“Robbeeeee I’m bored.”

Robbe doesn’t even look up from where he’s hunched over Sander’s desk. It’s the fourth time Sander has made that complaint in the past half an hour. Sander was impatient at the best of times; he found it impossible to pay attention to one thing.

“The world is full of beauty, Robbe, and all of it deserves to be appreciated,” Sander told him once, and though Robbe had laughed and called him a pretentious asshole, he thinks the way Sander sees things is wonderfully innocent, so uncomplicated in a world so messy. It’s one of the things about Sander that he loves the most, that makes him stare a little too long, affection for him filling Robbe up from top to bottom.

Sander only truly focuses on his art. He’s breathtaking, his brow furrowed in concentration, his tongue just peeking out from between his teeth, the sinews of his hand tightening as he grips a brush or a pencil, and the careful flick of his fingers as he splashes colour and shade. He’s patient and careful.

Right now, though?

“Sander, some of us have actual work to do.”

Sander pouts, “Come on it’s just shapes or whatever. Can’t you do it later?”

“Shapes? That’s how you’re going to refer to trigonometry? What the fuck are they teaching you at that fancy art school?” he teases, cursing when a pillow pelts into the side of his head.

“I’ll have you know,” Sander sniffs, “That my school is training the next generation of _artistes_.”

“Mmhmm and when the world falls to some lethal plague, what help will you be?”

“You have far too much attitude for such a young man.”

Robbe rolls his eyes and finally turns around in his seat, taking in Sander laying on his stomach across the bed, “I’m only two years younger than you.”

“And think about how much wisdom I’ve accumulated in those two years.”

“You’re such an asshole,” Robbe laughs, but he sounds unbearably fond.

“Come on,” Sander sits up, “Take a break, let’s do something.”

Robbe casts a forlorn look at his half-finished assignment, but sighs and agrees. Sander clambers off the bed and opens the door, throwing a happy smile over his shoulder.

Robbe blushes at how easily he gave in and follows Sander out to the kitchen.

There’s late afternoon light, golden and thick, painting the tiles. It’s bright and fresh, the scent of lemon cleaning spray permeating the air.

Robbe jumps up and sits on the bench top, watching Sander cross to the sink.

Sander turns on the small radio in the corner, that Robbe has seen Sander’s mum listen to while she scrubs dishes, and some slow old song spills from the tinny speakers. Robbe scrunches up his nose, but Sander lights up.

“My mum and dad used to dance to this song all the time.”

“Dance?”

“Yeah!” Sander says excitedly, “They used to slow dance, right here in the kitchen actually. They’d waltz around the counter.”

Robbe tries to recall the last time he saw his parents touch each other, kiss each other goodbye or hug embarrassingly in front of him. He can’t remember. 

He laughs quickly, shaking those thoughts away, “That sounds like your parents.”

“They’re disgustingly in love, I know.” Sander grins like he’s embarrassed, but really Robbe knows he’s not. “When I was little, I used to get so jealous, I wanted to dance too.”

“You did?”

“Yeah, so my Dad let me stand on his shoes and he’d do the steps for me, I loved it.”

Robbe giggles, “Did he tell you you were dancing the girl part?”

Sander shakes his head in mock-disappointment, “Now, now Robbe we don’t tolerate any kind of sexism in this house. It’s perfectly fine for a man not to lead.”

“Whatever you say.”

Sander’s eyes take on that shimmer and Robbe’s stomach jumps.

“Come,” Sander says. His smile is full of mischief and poorly disguised affection.

“What?”

“Get down, we’re dancing.”

“Sander-” but Sander has already taken both his hands and tugged him off the counter, drawing him into the centre of the room.

Robbe makes a strangled noise of protest, but Sander shushes him.

“Okay now, hands here,”—he places one of Robbe’s hands on his shoulder. Robbe resists the urge to squeeze down hard in nervousness— “and here.”

He clasps Robbe’s other hand; their fingers intertwine and Robbe’s heart stutters.

“Okay,” Sander looks down at their feet. Robbe stares at the slope of his nose before forcing himself to do the same, “Now we just step in square, like this, one two three four.”

He starts stepping back and Robbe follows tentatively. It’s harder than he thought, and he trips sporadically over both his and Sander’s feet, chuckling nervously each time he does. But Sander doesn’t laugh at him, just keeps them moving, strong and steadfast.

Robbe feels light-headed, has to keep reminding himself that he’s present, that he’s here and real. There’s only him and Sander, the low music and sun warmed kitchen tiles beneath their bare feet. And he knows, he knows this is different. He wouldn’t do this with Jens, doesn’t want to, can’t imagine it with anyone, but Sander.

Robbe stumbles again and Sander holds him tighter on instinct, pulling them chest to chest. And though Robbe knows he should, he doesn’t move back, but neither does Sander and now they’re doing nothing more than swaying back and forth, temple to temple. He’s glad Sander isn’t looking at him, he would crumble to dust under the intensity of his eyes. Everything about Sander is overwhelming in the best way. His gaze, his smile, his voice, and his touch. Sander does everything one hundred percent, all the way or no way, and it makes Robbe feel like the luckiest person alive.

The song changes and Robbe thinks God must be on his side today, because it’s another love song, slow and saccharine, and their steps never falter. Robbe thinks of the videos in his search, history and the pain in his chest and the hard lines of Sander’s shoulder beneath his palm. He presses his nose into Sander’s neck and breathes in deep. They keep dancing.

+++

Robbe drops his school bag next to the front door with thump.

As he toes off his sneakers he calls out, “Mama?”

He hears her shuffling, so he knows she’s somewhere nearby. The smell of garlic and tomato wafts towards him and his stomach growls. Kitchen then.

“In here, schat!”

He follows her voice and finds her standing at the stove. She’s stirring a skillet of red sauce and there’s a pot of spaghetti boiling off to the left. She hums to herself as she alternates between the two, her dress swishing around her calves as she moves. She’s so light and gentle, swathed in floral print, and walking on bare feet. He loves her like this. It’s how he pictures her in his head: carefree.

“Smells good, Mama.”

She smiles at him over her shoulder, eyes twinkling, “I know. I was craving pasta all day.”

Robbe takes a seat on the other side of the counter, eyeing a block of half grated parmesan. When her back is turned, he reaches over and pinches a bit, letting the sharp taste settle on his tongue. He lets her humming and the sizzle of the stove fade into the background, a pleasant white noise. It’s relaxing and _homely_ ; he hasn’t felt like this in a long while.

He catches sight of her work ID, the navy lanyard tangled on the countertop. He doesn’t want to broach the subject, especially not when she’s in such a good mood, but he knows he has to ask.

He tries to keep his voice as light as he can, “How’s work?”

He hates himself when she deflates a little, but she replies, her voice strained, “It’s good, they’re avoiding putting me on any long-term projects, but that’s probably for the best.”

“But Mama—” he hesitates. “The stretches of time you’ve been taking off are getting longer and longer.”

Her shoulders slump and she braces both hands on the edge of the bench, “Robbe, really they’ve been so understanding—”

“I know, I know they have but,” he sighs, “it’s getting worse isn’t it?”

A tense silence unfurls between them. They both know it’s true. It’s the voices first, that’s when she starts slipping, wired and talking to herself, but now it’s more. Each time she gets lost in the forest of her own mind; she ventures further into the trees than the last. Paranoia confines her to her bed and breeds panic and fear like mould, building and building until she’s scratching desperately at her own skin. And all Robbe can do is watch.

She switches off the burner with a sigh of her own and turns to face him.

She looks so sad and Robbe feels like shit, “I’m doing so well right now Robbe, can’t we just focus on that? It’s been months since the last time, aren’t I allowed to be happy?”

“Mama of course you’re allowed to be happy, I want you to be happy.”

His voice turns pleading, he’s scared for her and his worry is attempting to lodge permanently in his brain.

So, he asks, “But what if it starts again?” because he has to, because it will.

“I don’t know,” she whispers, and it sounds as lost and hopeless as Robbe feels.

“Dad needs to get you help, Mama. I can’t keep watching you suffer over and over again and not know how to help you. I love you.”

“Oh, Robbe.” Tears glitter in her eyes like diamonds. Before she can say anything more the front door opens, and Robbe hears his father’s heavy footfalls.

His mother hastily wipes her eyes and returns to the stove, and Robbe does his best to look nonchalant.

His father is rolling up his shirt sleeves as he steps into the kitchen, folding the fabric up past his forearms. Robbe hates the way his eyes drift over the two of them, fast and fleeting, too guilty to stare too long. He decides to fixate on the pots his mother is minding instead.

“Looks good, what are you making?” It’s a general question, so close to what Robbe himself said, but it’s so determinedly casual that it sets Robbe’s teeth on edge.

“Spaghetti,” she says, “It should be ready any minute.”

His mother doesn’t turn around to properly greet him and his father doesn’t move towards her. The distance between them seems like miles.

“Sounds great, uh, how was work?”

“Fine.”

“Good, good, glad things are normal.”

Her back stiffens and Robbe’s hands close into fists, knuckles white and tight against the skin.

His father either isn’t aware of or deliberately ignores the rising tension in the room. He steps up behind Robbe and ruffles his hair, Robbe grits his teeth.

“Robbe how was school?”

“Good.”

“Good to hear.” He pauses. His dad seems to have run out of polite things to say. “Well, I’m going to my study.”

“Of course, you are,” Robbe mutters.

“Robbe—” his mama begins, sighing, but his dad cuts her off.

“Son, why are you taking that tone with me?”

“Maybe because I’m sick of you ditching us all the time?” He’s quivering with poorly concealed frustration and it’s making him defiant.

His father is gruff as he questions, “What is that supposed to mean?”

He stares his father down, hackles rising, “You’re never home and even when you are you just shut yourself in your study. You barely speak to us and you never want to spend time with us.”

His father frowns, “That’s not true, Robbe.”

“Yes, it is!” He looks at his mother, standing in the corner, arms around herself. He’s upsetting her, but he doesn’t know what else to do. He feels so useless and he just wants his dad to listen, “Do you even want to be here?”

“Of course, I do, Robbe. I love you both very much.”

“If you love Mama, you’ll get her help.”

He sighs, “Robbe there are just some things you don’t understand.”

It’s so fucking condescending Robbe wants to scream. He doesn’t even sound irritated only tired and stubborn and that just makes Robbe angrier.

“Are you fucking kidding me?” he spits.

“Don’t throw that kind of language at me, I am your father.”

But Robbe is done, so done with this conversation. Red hot anger prickles behind his ears.

“Fuck you,” he hisses.

He can’t hear how loud his bedroom door slams, not over the ringing in his ears.

+++

Robbe is minutes from falling asleep.

Sander’s fingers cut gentle trails through his hair, the curls twining carefully around his hand. Robbe hums in contentment, wants to melt into the floor and never get up again. Sander catches on a spot behind his ear and a shiver skitters down his back.

Sander is singing under his breath, Robbe doesn’t know the song and Sander’s voice isn’t perfect, but it’s soothing and familiar.

Sander’s bedroom door opens and Robbe looks up from his place in his lap. Sander’s mum is leaning through the crack in door.

“Bye boys! Sander, I put money in your account to buy food this weekend. Stay out of trouble.”

Sander groans, “Just go on your weird old married couple romantic getaway and let us young people live.”

“Okay, okay we’re leaving, love you both.”

The boys each echo a _love you_ back, but Robbe feels it split him in two. Sander’s parents are so kind, and they treat him like one of their own. Sander’s mum kisses her red lipstick onto his cheek and force feeds him second helpings of chicken casserole, and Sander’s dad ruffles his hair and talks to him about articles in the National Geographic. They treat him like he’s a part of their family, and that makes Robbe feel immeasurably guilty. He has his own family, or at least fractured parts of one. He has a father who’s a stranger in his own house and a mother who gets so lost inside her head he’s afraid one day she’ll never return. 

But Sander and his parents make him feel whole, they ask him about his day and though there’s no way they know what exactly is going on in his house, they give him an escape he isn’t sure he deserves.

When they all sat down to dinner together earlier in the week and Sander’s parents announced the cabin trip they were taking for their anniversary and they told Robbe he was welcome to stay the whole weekend and keep Sander company, and the gratitude Robbe felt for them threatened to burst out of his chest.

Robbe closes his eyes as Sander’s hand returns to his scalp and listens to his parents shuffle around the front part of the house, picking up bags. The door thuds closed and a few minutes later he hears the rumble of a car engine as they pull out of the driveway.

Sander stays quiet for a while and then halts his ministrations. Robbe makes a disgruntled sound in the back of his throat and pops an eye open. Sander is smiling at him upside down.

“I have a surprise for you.”

Robbe frowns. “What is it?”

“Let me up and you’ll find out.”

Robbe heaves a big sigh and sits up, crossing his legs. Sander stands and darts out of the room, still singing to himself. _Cute_ , Robbe thinks, and smiles to himself in that sappy, unconscious way.

He rushes to school his expression when Sander walks back into the room, but he’s quickly distracted by the two six packs of beer, trapped under each of Sander’s arms.

“Beer?”

“Beer!” Sander cheers, and Robbe is so fucking endeared by it that he wants to roll his eyes and laugh at the same time. 

Sander copies his position, sitting cross-legged across from him and puts the beer between them. Robbe can already see condensation sliding down the brown glass.

“Sander, I hate to break it to you, but I’ve had beer before, this is Belgium.”

Sander scrunches up his nose in exasperation. “I know that, Robin, but have you ever been drunk before?”

“No,” he admits.

“Do you want to get drunk together for the first time?”

Robbe’s eyebrows lift in surprise, “You’ve never gotten drunk with your edgy art friends before?”

Sander has a lot of friends from art school and they all party a lot. He’s received pictures of Sander in the early hours of the morning, face half painted by coloured light and a cup of something clutched in his hand. But apparently Sander hadn’t been getting as rowdy as he thought. Robbe hates picturing Sander like that, dancing close to different faceless bodies, pushed hungrily into dark corners. The knowledge that he hasn’t even been drunk before now helps him dismantle those thoughts and tames something dangerous inside him. 

Sander ducks his head and Robbe almost misses the sweet bashful expression on his face, “No,” -he shrugs— “I wanted to do it with you.”

Robbe is powerless to stop his responding grin. “Okay.”

Sander looks up and his eyes shine with amusement. “You’re letting me corrupt you?”

Robbe rolls his eyes hard. “We’re drinking beer, not joining a gang.” He reaches out and tears the cardboard away from the neck of one of the bottles. “Is there even enough here to get drunk?”

“It’s all about how fast you drink it,” Sander smirks, “Six in an hour and I’m sure you’d be blacked out.”

“Shut up, I would not.”

Sander tears out his own bottle and gets a bottle opener out of his shorts pocket. “We’ll see.”

He pops the cap off his own glass and then hands the opener to Robbe.

The bottle hisses as it opens and a thin mist swirls up and out the neck.

“Skål.” Sander’s gaze is intense

“Skål.” Their drinks clack against each other and their eyes stay locked as they raise them to their lips.

Robbe takes a sip and the liquid crackles lightly down his throat. It’s not exactly pleasant, but it’s not bad either, sour and filling. It makes his stomach warm.

He takes another, and another.

Robbe blinks and suddenly he’s downed four bottles and is working on his fifth.

His head feels light on his shoulders, like a balloon. He thinks if he wasn’t flush against Sander from foot to shoulder, grounded by his weight, he’d float away.

“I can’t feel my lips,” Robbe giggles, slumped against the side of Sander’s bed. He takes turns pressing each of his fingers against his bottom lip trying to coax out some feeling.

“That’s what it feels like when you kiss too long,” Sander slurs, his head lolling to the side to observe him. Robbe makes a grossed-out groan and Sander laughs, “What do you think kissing is gross?”

Robbe considers. It’s not like he doesn’t think about kissing; it’s all his friends want to talk about in the school yard. Jens is always lamenting about how badly he wants to make out with Emma Mertens, and he’s seen the other boys sneak off with girls from their class to kiss behind the lockers. Robbe just can’t share their enthusiasm. The girls in his class are nice, they smell sweet and he knows they’re pretty, with silky hair and rosy cheeks, but he just doesn’t want to kiss them. He’s never felt that longing or desire the other boys describe and he tries not to let that bother him.

But right now, he doesn’t really care. The pleasant buzzing in his brain and his limbs is making him feel sleepy and unguarded. He’s incapable of feeling embarrassment and regret in this state. It’s the freest he’s been since he was a little kid, since he believed that if he swung high enough, he could scoop the stars out of the sky.

He giggles again, “I don’t think it’s bad, I just don’t know what it’s like, I’ve never kissed anyone.”

Sander falls quiet, and Robbe wonders if maybe he should feel embarrassed about that (and maybe he will when the alcohol bleeds out of his system). How many people has Sander kissed? Sander would tell him if he wanted to know, Sander tells him everything.

He turns to ask and breathes in sharply.

Sander is so close their noses bump. His eyes are hooded and so, so soft. Robbe doesn’t dare to blink. Sander searches his face, looking for what Robbe doesn’t know. And that’s when Robbe feels it: the longing. It threatens to yank his heart up through his lungs and out his mouth, leaving him flayed and open. His pulse is beating against his temples and he’s hot all over. Robbe opens his mouth and now they’re breathing the same air.

When Sander finally speaks, it’s low and raw, it rattles something loose in his sternum and Robbe _aches,_ “Can I kiss you?”

And the _yes_ he breathes out sounds less like an answer and more like a plea, his own desperation loud in his ears. 

Sander leans in slow; his hand comes up and caresses the side of Robbe’s face, his thumb smoothing a curl of Robbe’s hair behind his ear. Their lips graze in the briefest hint of a kiss, Sander’s breath hot on his mouth and Robbe feels like he’s dying. They’re so close, Robbe can see the scar at the corner of Sander’s eye and the rings around his irises. Time halts in the space between their mouths, dragging to an agonizing stop.

Robbe’s eyes flutter closed against his will, anticipation pricking along his arms and down his neck, but he doesn’t move. Finally, Sander slopes his mouth up and seals their lips together, soft and tentative. He tastes like stale beer and something warm and honey-like and Robbe does everything he can to commit it to memory.

Sander is unbearably gentle, never amps up the lazy shift of their lips and Robbe is both glad and frustrated, wants more, but is so overwhelmed, by Sander and his lips and his smell. His own hand goes to Sander’s cheek and he draws him as close as he can, his thoughts one long unbreakable stream of _yesyesyesyesyesyesyes_.

Robbe feels Sander start to pull away and he has to hold back the whine of protest that crawls up his throat. When their lips separate, Robbe feels cold and thrown off kilter like he’s just stood too fast and is fumbling the first few steps. When he opens his eyes, Sander gives him a gossamer smile.

“There,” he murmurs, “Now you’ll always know your first kiss was from someone who loves you.”

Sander has stars in his eyes and Robbe is filled to the brim with tenderness for him.

Soon the alcohol begins to wear and makes them both drowsy. Sander drops his head into the curve of Robbe shoulder and when Robbe looks down Sander is already asleep his face soft and lax, his breath coming out in gentle puffs.

Robbe isn’t sure how long he sits there, his shoulder aching under the weight, but he doesn’t move.

He lifts his hand and plays carefully with the hair resting over Sander’s forehead, twisting the strands between his fingers until his own eyes droop closed and sleep takes him.

+++

The next week, Sander stops replying to his texts.

Robbe’s first instinct is to overthink. Sander must regret kissing him, it’s the only explanation he can think of. And that fucking hurts, because Robbe couldn’t regret it if he tried. Sander giving him his first kiss is one of those memories that’ll be stamped in his brain forever, no amount of beer could have made him forget it, how gentle Sander was, how he tasted. The idea that Sander could regret it… Robbe doesn’t know how to live with that kind of disappointment. 

He spends days worrying over it but decides that even if Sander does regret kissing him, he’d rather that than not talking to him at all. So, he goes to Sander’s house and knocks nervously on the front door.

Sander’s mum opens it, looking tired and less refined than usual, but she still has fond smile for him, “Robbe, how are you?”

“Hey, I’m fine. Is Sander home?” He bites his lip. “He, uh, hasn’t been replying to my texts.”

“Oh, Robbe honey, Sander’s not feeling well, he’s been stuck in bed for a while.” Her face somehow gets more tired and there’s concern hidden behind her eyes.

She lets him in anyway, and he walks gingerly to Sander’s room.

He doesn’t want to knock, in case Sander’s asleep or it startles him, so he slips inside without announcing himself and closes the door swiftly behind him.

It’s pitch black inside the room, and it takes a long moment for Robbe’s eyes to adjust to the darkness. He can only just make out Sander’s form on the bed. Robbe doesn’t say anything, but he sits carefully on the edge of the mattress. Sander doesn’t move as Robbe’s weight shifts the mattress, doesn’t even let out an exhale. Robbe isn’t sure if he’s asleep, if he knows he’s there.

He runs a cautious hand down Sander’s back over the blanket, Sander twitches and then rolls over, his eyes blinking sluggishly open, bleary with sleep.

“Hi.” His voice is husky and cracked with disuse.

“Hi.” Robbe looks around for a drink and after seeing an empty glass asks, “Do you want me to get you some water?”

“No. I’m okay.”

Sander doesn’t look like he wants to say anything more, he looks tired and like every word is an enormous effort. Robbe wonders if his throat is sore or if he feels so lethargic he can’t speak.

“Next time you might want to send me an SOS letting me know you’re sick so I don’t come storming over to your house and harass your mother,” Robbe jokes, but Sander doesn’t smile and Robbe notices the heavy bags under his eyes for the first time.

“I’m sorry,” he croaks, “I wanted to text you, I just…”

“It’s okay,” Robbe assures him, “It’s fine, I was just kidding.”

Sander won’t look him in the eye now, stares at his hand where it lays sadly on the sheets between them. 

Robbe wants to wipe the defeated look off his face.

“I’m sorry you’re sick,” he says instead.

Sander doesn’t really answer, just makes a noncommittal noise and burrows deeper into the blankets. He doesn’t say anything else. Robbe contemplates leaving, isn’t really sure if Sander wants him there or if he’s just bothering him while he’s feeling shitty.

But then Robbe hears a mumble from the cocoon of blankets, “Can you stay until I go to sleep?”

Robbe reaches out and brushes his thumb tentatively over the skin of Sander’s cheek. “Yeah, of course.”

Sander leans into the touch for a moment and then shuffles away, pressing his face heavily into the pillow.

Robbe sits next to him until he falls back asleep, waits until little aborted snores are emitting from his parted lips before he leaves the room.

He says goodbye to Sander’s mum on the way out, tells her to tell Sander to text him when he feels better and then heads out the door. He goes home feeling both lighter and heavier at the same time.

+++

“Do you think we get to choose what happens in our life?”

“Hmm?” Robbe says as he stares at a crack in his bedroom ceiling.

He hears the sheets rustling as Sander changes position, his feet shifting by Robbe’s head.

“Do you think everything is predetermined? There’s nothing you can do and your life just goes where fate decides? Or do we get to choose, does what we do matter?”

The question is unexpected, and Sander sounds unusually serious as he asks it. They’ve been sitting in relative silence for a while so Robbe wonders how long Sander’s mind has been swirling, before dragging him down into existential dread.

“Well, I think it’s kind of both,” Robbe says.

“What do you mean?”

“I read this book in the library the other day, about parallel universes, and the idea that with every choice you make the universe splits until there’s an infinite number of different universes existing side by side with every different variation of every decision you’ve made. So yeah, you get a choice, and your choice matters to you in this universe, but everything that can and will happen is happening as we speak so it also doesn’t.”

Sander pauses letting the words sink in, but then he lets out a dramatic sigh.

“You’re so smart.” Robbe can hear the grin in his voice.

“Shut up!” Robbe groans, throwing an arm over his eyes in embarrassment.

“No, you are! My little genius.”

“Sanderrrr stop.”

Sander giggles to himself, but his laughter dies and fades to nothing.

When Sander speaks again his tone is sombre, “I don’t know if I like that.”

“What?”

“The idea of all those parallel universes. It makes me feel lonely.”

“Why lonely?” Robbe asks, sitting up, needing to see Sander’s face.

“Doesn’t it make you feel so small and alone, knowing that every one of the millions of choices you make are playing out somewhere? It makes me sad, going back through all my thoughts, the good ones and the bad ones, wondering what would have happened if I hadn’t thought that thought, if I thought something else instead and it goes on and on like that and it never ends. An infinite number of possibilities for me to agonise over forever.”

Sander won’t look at him, so Robbe watches his chest rise and fall as he breathes.

“That is kind of scary,” Robbe admits, “But all those decisions made you you, they lead you to this exact moment in time, here hanging out in my bedroom with me right now.”

“Do you think there’s a universe where we don’t meet?” Sander’s words drip with vulnerability, so heavy they crack in the middle.

Robbe’s thought about it before, what would’ve happened if his mother had been too tired to take him to the park, if they had forgotten their keys and showed up ten minutes late or decided to go somewhere else entirely. He and Sander don’t go to the same school, they aren’t the same age, there would have been no reason for them to run into each other. But Robbe can’t help but think in some naïve part of his brain, that he and Sander were meant to meet, if not right then, then later, that no matter what, the universe would get its shit together and put Sander in his orbit. He doesn’t want to contemplate what ifs because a universe without Sander isn’t one he wants to be in.

“Even if there is,” he begins slowly, “I’m glad we live in this universe.”

Sander looks at him finally and his expression is unguarded. “Me too.”

+++

The grass is slightly damp, and it sticks Robbe’s t-shirt to his back.

It’s not so bad though, it cools his skin which had been baked warm and freckly by the midday sun. He’s spread out on the ground, looking up at the smattering of leaves above him.

The crack of skateboards hitting the concrete still rattles on in the background, but he and Jens had given up on any skating some time ago as the heat threatened to etch their necks permanently red.

Sander sits inches from him, leaning up against the trunk of the tree and having a conversation with Jens as Robbe listens along.

“She was so hot,” Jens says, still talking about some girl he hooked up with at a party on the weekend. 

Robbe sees Sander rolls his eyes, “Yeah, we know, you’ve said it three times.”

“What?! She was!”

“Yeah, but like, what was she like?” Sander asks.

Jens looks at him dumbly. “Bro I barely caught her name.”

Sander sighs, exasperated, “You couldn’t have spent five minutes talking about… I dunno music or something?”

“She was hot, she wanted to hook up, I didn’t ask questions. What was I supposed to stop her and ask her her favourite colour or some shit?” He’s looking at Sander like he’s a fucking idiot and Robbe sits up and smiles at them, amused. 

“I just like to get to know someone, before I stick my tongue in their mouth,” Sander says shrugging.

Jens snorts, “Dude that’s so fucking gay.”

Jens is looking at Sander when he says it, so he misses the way Robbe flinches.

Robbe laughs out of habit, but it sounds brittle and weak. Sander doesn’t laugh at all. Robbe knew he wouldn’t. Robbe knows Jens doesn’t mean it like that, that it’s just a turn of phrase, but it hurts, sharp and unexpected and shame sears under his skin.

He can feel Sander’s stare burning into the side of his head. Jens must notice something is off because he clears his throat awkwardly and starts picking at the grass.

Sander doesn’t say anything, and that makes Robbe feel a million times worse.

The conversation never really gets back to normal after that. Robbe is quiet as he filters through his feelings, annoyed that he couldn’t just brush off Jens’ comment for the harmless joke that it was, but also somehow disappointed that he didn’t say anything and frustrated because what could he have possibly said? It’s not a big deal, but it is, and he’s caught right in the middle.

Sander is quiet too, responds to Jens clumsy attempts to reignite the conversation with single syllable answers. It doesn’t take long for him to stand up and gather his things.

“I’m heading home.” He turns to Robbe, “You coming?”

His eyes are pale, swirling with a melancholy combination of hurt and anger. Robbe wants to follow him, to soothe the sting of Jens’ words with gentle reassurances, but anxiety roots him to the spot.

He shakes his head and looks down at his lap, unable to meet Sander’s eyes.

Sander walks away and Robbe’s heart sinks into his stomach.

He doesn’t talk to Sander for two days after and it’s the longest two days of his life.

He’s still trying to work up the courage to send him a text when Sander shows up at his door with an understanding smile and eyes so kind Robbe’s insides flood with relief.

And if Robbe hugs him harder and longer than normal, well that’s nobody’s business but theirs.

+++

He presses close to Sander’s back as they move down the hallway, hooks his fingers gently in the hem of his t-shirt. The music is almost intolerably loud, Robbe swears he can see it shaking the walls as they make their way to the centre of the house, knocking accidently against the teenagers lining the walls.

Here Robbe feels years younger than he is. All these 16- and 17-year olds seem so much more mature in the darkness of the night. The boys are so tall, all sharp lines and broad backs and the girls so willowy and soft. He supposes Sander is one of them now, tall and defined, the hard cut of his jaw and cheekbones stark under the neon lights. He’s something out of a movie, young and perfect.

Sander, sensing Robbe’s anxiety, hooks an arm over his shoulder and steers them through to the living room. No one glances their way, and Robbe is thankful. They meld into the night with their dark hair and dark clothes.

Sander scoops them each a drink from an unattended cooler up against the wall, twisting Robbe’s open for him before passing it back. Robbe takes a huge gulp, lets the bubbles burn down his throat.

The air in the living room is so thick, Robbe finds it hard to breathe. It’s too hot and it’s hard to move.

It’s a relief when Sander leans in to yell over the music, “Those are my friends over there on the couch.”

Robbe looks out into the semi-darkness and can just make out the hazy outlines of three or four people splayed out over the couch Sander is pointing to. He hovers behind Sander as he crosses the room, cutting a path for them through the people.

As they get closer Robbe can see a girl with a silver nose ring and purple streaked hair, perched on the arm of the couch. Next to her is a boy with curly brown hair and a sharp nose and his feet resting in the lap of another boy wearing a beanie and a scowl. The final boy has a rounder face and a welcoming smile.

Sander’s friends are as unique and interesting as he is and Robbe can’t help but feel immediately out of place. Do Sander’s friends even know about him? Do they even care? Do they think he’s just some kid Sander keeps around out of obligation or nostalgia? He trails nervously behind Sander as they approach the group.

Sander reaches down and clasps the boy with the nice smile’s hand and pulls him into a quick hug, before doing the same with the other boys in the line and finally offering the girl a high five and a cheesy grin. The girl rolls her eyes but indulges him, the snap of their hands audibles over the music.

Robbe shuffles awkwardly on his feet in the background. Sander turns around to him with an encouraging smile and gives him a hand. Robbe takes it though he blushes and allows Sander to lead him forward. He steers Robbe in front of him as if presenting him to the group and puts his hands on his shoulders.

“Guys, this is my best friend Robbe, Robbe this is Adi, Aiden, Lucas and Elle.”

Robbe offers a shy, “Hi.”

The curly haired boy, Aiden, cries out, “The famous Robbe! Dude, where’s he been hiding you?”

Before Robbe can work out how to answer that question, Sander cuts in, pulling Robbe tight against his side.

“I wanted to keep him all to myself.” Sander shrugs, completely unashamed. Robbe blushes, glad it can’t be seen in the semi-darkness. 

“Hey man, what’s up,” Adi says to Robbe with a kind smile and puts out his hand. Robbe takes it and they clap each other on the back.

“Nothing much, Sander pretty much begged me to come with him to this party, so here I am.”

Adi laughs, “Yeah he’s pretty fucking annoying, I’d give in just to shut him up, too.”

Sander lets out an indignant _hey_ as Robbe replies, “Yeah.” He decides to leave out the fact that he’d probably do anything Sander asked, just as long as they were together and Sander was smiling.

Adi jumps up out of his seat, “Let me grab you two chairs, hold up.”

He disappears into another room, and Elle leans in closer to get a better look at Robbe. She studies him carefully and her eyes are leaden and knowing. She turns her gaze to Sander and her mouth flicks into a dangerous smirk.

“He’s cute, Sander.”

Sander’s eyes narrow. “Don’t even think about it.”

It’s playful, but there it is again, that edge, that razor sharp seriousness that Robbe can’t shake, a tension he can’t place. It’s making him unsettled and nervous. He’s not sure what to do with himself, doesn’t really know why Sander invited him or how to act here.

Beanie boy, Lucas, reaches into his coat pocket and pulls out an almost empty pack of cigarettes. “Sander you want to share?”

“Yeah, sure.”

Sander takes Adi’s vacated spot on the couch and Robbe instantly misses his presence next to him.

Adi returns with two wire backed chairs and flips Sander off seeing the new couch arrangements, but hands Robbe one chair and takes the other for himself, tugging it forward close to the couch so they’re sitting in a deformed circle. Robbe places his own chair further back—he’s not going to join in on smoking (he’s fairly certain cigarettes aren’t his thing) and he doesn’t want to be a buzz kill. He fiddles with the half empty beer bottle in his clammy hands, tearing at the label with restless fingers.

He looks up when he hears the mechanical click of the lighter, Lucas lights the cigarette, the end of it phases into an eclipsed moon, orange and smouldering. He takes a long drag before he holds it out for Sander to take.

Robbe watches as Sander hooks the cigarette between two fingers and brings it to his lips. Robbe’s eyes drag over the lines of his hands, drifting up to his mouth where it’s poised around the filter. His mouth half curls as he inhales and then he pulls away, pausing before letting the smoke escape from his parted lips, spiralling up and veiling his face. He looks otherworldly.

He’s beautiful, Robbe knows he’s beautiful has thought so from the first moment they met, but this time there’s something more, something steeped in heat and longing. Robbe can feel it burning down low in his stomach, not quite ready to lick into flame.

“So,” Aiden says, focus on Robbe as he passes the cigarette back to Elle, “You’re not in 4th year yet?”

Robbe’s eyes slide away from Sander’s mouth as fast as they can and he shakes his head, hopes no one noticed. “No, but I start next year.”

“Oh, where do you go? Not transferring to Kunsthumaniora?”

Robbe giggles, “No, no I’m shit at anything art related, I go to KA Berchem.”

Aiden, and Elle who was listening in, nod but their attention is soon drawn elsewhere as they’re pulled into a conversation with Lucas about some asshole teacher they all have.

Robbe sits back, glad for the break. He watches them pass the cigarette back and forth for a long while before they light another; he sips idly on his beer and listens to their conversations without participating. He doesn’t feel like talking, doesn’t have much to add anyway, he doesn’t know anything about the politics of high school. He loves spending time with Sander, but he’s fully aware of every centimetre of distance between them and his throat grows tighter.

He starts when a hand falls on his shoulder and he looks up to see a girl standing over him, her long hair tumbling down towards him like rain. She’s a pretty girl, wide brown eyes and bow lips, the kind of girl Jens would stumble over himself to talk to.

“Hi,” she says, tucking the falling strands behind her ear. Her silver earring glints under the disco lights.

“Hi.” He sounds raspy from the beer and maybe from uncertainty, but she doesn’t seem to mind. She trails a finger down his arm, and he resists the impulse to lean away from the touch.

“Do you wanna dance?”

He’s kind of shocked at the question, a girl asking him to dance is completely uncharted territory. Robbe’s never been the object of attention, let alone female attention. At school there’s always Jens standing right next to him, handsome and tall, always with jokes and complimentary words that make girls swoon and forget about Robbe entirely. Not that he minds, he doesn’t need anyone to notice him.

Robbe’s gaze falls back to Sander, who’s still distracted, passing the cigarette around the circle. He laughs loudly at something Adi says, and Robbe clenches his jaw. He won’t be missed and suddenly he can’t bear to watch Sander any longer, so he nods and lets her take his hand and lead him to the centre of the room.

The speakers are so loud and the beat throbs uncomfortably in his sternum. Under the lights he can see flashes of other teenagers bathed in pinks and blues, bodies pushed tight together, lips and hands gliding over slick skin.

Robbe doesn’t resist when she slides her arms around his neck, presses close to him and he’s enveloped by the scent of synthetic flowers and vodka. She’s all soft skin and subtle curves and he swallows the lump in his throat. This is what he’s supposed to want, every single guy in his class would be looking on in envy, but all Robbe can feel is this overwhelming restlessness _._

He closes his eyes and follows her as she moves them to the music, runs her hands over his shoulders and up his neck. He tries to ground himself in the moment, but it’s so stifling, there’s sweat trickling down his back. His hands are on her hips, the denim of her skirt scratching against his fingers as he holds her, unwilling to dip any lower. The syncopation of the music and his own racing heart is making him sick.

He feels her breath hot on his ear before her lips connect with his cheek, dragging across the skin. She’s tracing a path to his mouth and Robbe lets her, a twisted kind of curiosity buzzing in his brain. She slides her lips against his and he holds his breath. It’s wet and warm, but nothing more, and Robbe knows for certain that he will never want any girl like this.

He knew, he knew but he also had never been sure before and it’s the strangest sense of loss. He sort of wants to cry, but he can’t push her off, can’t shove her away. He doesn’t want to hurt her, despite every single part of him screaming to get away.

He opens his eyes, tries to focus on anything else, anything other than the kiss that leaves him empty and the girl who’s giving it. He almost gasps into her mouth when his and Sander’s eyes meet across the room. He’s leaning against the wall, alone, Robbe can’t even see the couch anymore from where they’re both standing.

Robbe’s knees almost buckle under the weight of his stare. His heart is pounding and something like desire is coiling up his spine. Sander doesn’t blink and his eyes are so dark and deep and Robbe is drowning in them. He kisses the girl harder and watches as Sander’s hand clenches around the neck of his beer bottle.

The girl is fully plastered against him, her lips eager, but he can’t feel her. He can’t feel anything but the weight of Sander’s eyes on him and the lust curling in his gut. The way Sander is looking at him burns through his bones. He wants to crawl out of his own skin. 

Sander is staring at Robbe like he knows that it’s _his_ tongue Robbe is picturing inside his mouth and _his_ hands on his neck. Like he knows Robbe doesn’t want to kiss anyone but him.

It’s too much, he’s choking on a combination of guilt and yearning and fear. Robbe breaks away from the girl, mumbling apologies and bolts. He fights against the tides of taller bodies and tries to find the nearest wall, desperate for some kind of escape. 

Warm fingers close around his wrist and he looks up and finds Sander towering over him. Sander searches his face, eyes no longer clouded but filled with compassion and worry.

“Robbe, do you want to go home?” he asks as softly as he can to still be heard over the noise.

Robbe swallows and nods, too keyed up to say anything. Sander squeezes his arm and then walks over to his friends.

He must make up some kind of excuse, it’s brief and he’s hurried as he waves goodbye, doesn’t spare them another parting glance.

He makes his way back and flicks his head to indicate Robbe to follow him out and starts cutting a path through the crowd. Robbe feels Sanders fingers ghost over his own as they swing by their sides and though he wants to, he doesn’t reach out and twine their hands together.

Once they step outside, the night air flows into his lungs, cold and refreshing. It grounds Robbe and he feels the emotions rattling inside him start to subside. He feels weak and a little shaky, but not quite so out of control anymore, like the world is caving in on him.

“You okay?” Sander asks, and Robbe feels guilty for making Sander leave so soon, but he’s so grateful and the way Sander is looking at him now with nothing but devotion sends something fluttering around Robbe’s rib cage.

“Yeah,” he says, and he has no idea whether he’s lying or not. Sander looks at him for a moment longer, but then nods and they set off down the street.

After a couple of blocks Robbe can’t hear the sounds of the party anymore or the thud of shoes against the concrete, just their laboured breathing. Robbe knows without asking that Sander is going to walk him all the way home. It’s an unspoken agreement that they’re not ready to be apart yet.

They don’t talk rest of the way, but it’s not uncomfortable, it’s easy, that’s how things have always been between them. Being with Sander is easiest thing he’s ever done.

They walk slowly, hopping up and down the curb and swinging around light posts they pass, Sander’s skin stained to honey gold as he sways under them.

Sander was beautiful in the darkness of the party, painted in neon and shadow, but Robbe likes this so much better. There’s no illusions here, just Sander, tanned skin and bright eyes, nothing more, nothing less, but still stunning. 

When they arrive at Robbe’s front door Robbe turns and they stand facing each other, just looking. It’s nothing like the charged looks from the party, it’s gentle and unhurried. Sander takes a step towards him, so careful, as if he doesn’t even want to disturb the air around them. The toes of their shoes bump together.

Sander leans in and Robbe waits for him. He inhales the cloying scent of smoke from where it clings to the fabric of Sander’s t-shirt. Sander kisses his cheek, soft and lingering, and it’s nothing like a goodbye, couldn’t be mistaken for anything other than the promise it is. When he moves back, Robbe immediately mourns the loss of him.

“Good night, Robbe.”

Everything inside Robbe stills and _oh_.

He knows that feeling fizzing in his chest can’t be anything other than love.

+++


	3. still don't know what i was waiting for

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> wow can't believe i got this chapter done honestly
> 
> morgan i love you with my whole heart thank you for editing this and being an eternal source of wisdom
> 
> TW//CW  
> \- manic episode  
> \- depressive episode  
> \- use of a homophobic slur

**_Fifteen/Seventeen_ **

* * *

When Robbe walks into the living room, early evening fog clouding his brain and sees his mother peering out between the curtains, at first he’s confused.

“Mama?” he rubs at his eyes, hoping to brush the image away, but when he looks again, she’s still there, back rigid as she stares out at the street. “What are you doing?”

“They’re watching us, Robbe.”

His heart drops into his stomach.

“Who’s watching Mama?”

“ _Them,_ Robbe, they’re everywhere, they’re watching the house,” she’s whispering, it’s frantic and rushed, the words tumbling over each other.

“Mama?” He goes to her, puts his hand on her shoulder, but she pushes him away.

“Don’t let them see you,” she urges, eyes wide and agitated.

“Okay, okay, I won’t let them see me,” he keeps his voice velvety soft. “Why don’t you go to your room, they can’t see you in there, and I’ll cover up all the windows okay?”

“Okay, but be careful, they’re out to get us.” She slinks away, eyes darting around the room, until she vanishes down the hallway.

Robbe takes a deep steadying breath, curls his hands into fists, feels his nails digging into the palms of his hands. Then he moves.

He walks from room to room, draws all the curtains and closes all the blinds. The house descends into darkness.

Robbe goes to bed.

He doesn’t sleep.

+++

Robbe teeters on the edge of the bowl, the breeze ruffling his hair.

“Dude, don’t be a fucking pussy!”

He rolls his shoulder back in annoyance, ignoring Moyo’s jeers and focuses on the drop below him.

He leans forward, balancing precariously, and then he lets himself fall and the ground rushes up to meet him. He speeds down the slope and then flies up the other side, catching the bottom of his board in one hand, hovering mid-air, before he falls back down, landing evenly with a satisfying click.

He grins in victory as he slows, and he can hear Jens cheers from the other side of the skatepark. Robbe rolls over, kicking his board up into his waiting fingers. He slaps Jens’ outstretched hand and then throws himself into the open seat next to him, swiping sweat off his forehead.

“Nice one man,” Jens compliments and Robbe preens, proud of himself.

“Thanks.”

Moyo grunts, “Eh it was ‘ight,”

“Yeah?” Robbe says laughing, “I’d like to see you do better.”

“Nah, wouldn’t want to show you up,” Moyo sniffs, though he knows he’s full of shit.

“Yeah okay,” Jens mocks, laughing, and gives Moyo a shove.

Robbe’s jean pocket vibrates and he reaches in and tugs out his phone. A new message from Sander flashes on the screen.

He opens it up and finds a picture of Sander standing in front of some crude graffiti tag accompanied by a long text condemning the lack of vision and artistic integrity. Robbe giggles under his breath and he can feel Jens hanging over his shoulder as he texts his reply.

“Is that Sander?” Jens asks and Robbe just nods still distracted as he types. “Ask him to come meet us.”

Robbe falters. Sander likes Jens, he does, he’s known him almost as long as Robbe has. The problem is that Jens has decided that Moyo is his fucking hero. Robbe spends his time with them trapped in endless conversations about girls and weed and sex. He learns to smoke, learns to like the haze and the fuzz, and he stays relatively silent as they talk about this girl and that girl and what exactly they’d like to do with them and it sucks, but he can deal. But then Moyo notices Robbe’s reluctance, latches on to it like a leech and makes Robbe the butt of every joke, like he can’t help himself, because _it’s not his fault Robbe acts like such a fag._

Sander had spent exactly one afternoon with the three of them, heard the way Moyo spoke to Robbe, saw Jens brush it off, and was forced to watch Robbe shrink in on himself with every comment. He’d pulled Robbe aside after, anger rippling across his face.

“Robbe, what the fuck? I know Jens talks like a fucking idiot sometimes and you let it slide, but this is a whole other thing.”

Robbe sighs, he knows the way Moyo talks to him is so far beyond stupid teasing, it’s deliberately unkind and it’s obviously homophobic, but none of that changes the fact that Robbe isn’t ready. He can’t start a fight he has no idea how to finish.

The worst part about the whole thing is that Robbe likes Moyo under all his bravado and asshole attitude. Moyo is funny and smart when he wants to be, he brings them weed and he rarely charges. Jens has to have seen something in him that he likes other than premium weed to keep inviting him out with them all the time. So Robbe sucks it up, he takes all the jokes, and he tries not to get angry. And sometimes he fails, but it’s the best he can do.

“I know, but they’re my friends, Sander, what am I supposed to do? If I just keep pretending it doesn’t bother me maybe he’ll stop,” Robbe had said.

“But it does bother you.”

Robbe couldn’t answer any louder than a whisper, “Of course it does.”

Sander had sighed and pulled Robbe into a hug, wrapping his arms tight around his back.

“I can’t listen to him talk to you like that, I only didn’t say anything because I knew you wouldn’t want me to,” he’d mumbled into Robbe’s hair.

Robbe had hugged him back, fisting his hands in the back of Sander’s jacket, “I know.”

So, Sander had stopped coming when they all hung out, and Robbe had stopped asking. It wasn’t a solution and Sander wasn’t happy about it, but it was all Robbe could do: Keep his two worlds separate and hope things didn’t fall apart.

“Ah, no, he doesn’t really feel like it today, maybe next time,” Robbe says shoving his phone back into his pocket and praying that they just let it go.

“He’s probably making excuses,” Moyo says.

"Sander just doesn't feel like coming out, he doesn't even like skating,” Robbe argues, irritation itching on his tongue.

Moyo scoffs, "He probably just got sick of hanging out with little kids."

Robbe scowls, "He still hangs out with me."

"Wonder how long that'll last," Moyo mutters.

A sickening mix of anger and fear bubbles in Robbe's stomach. He hates that Moyo can pick out all his deepest insecurities, drag them out and put them on display. He wonders darkly if Moyo knows how his words hit home.

He so tired, and he’s already sick of dealing with Moyo’s attitude today, his tolerance for bullshit at an all time low.

He pulls out his phone again, texts Sander quickly to ask when he’ll be home. He gets an immediate reply – 20 minutes. It’ll take Robbe that long to get there, so he pockets his phone and stands.

“I’m heading home, I have stuff to do.”

Jens looks like he wants to argue, but he doesn’t say anything just nods and offers him a fist bump. Robbe ponders whether Jens has noticed him ditching early so often, if he knows Robbe is lying when he says he has things to do. If he cares as much as he used to.

Moyo says a breezy, “Later man,” and Robbe mirrors him, though his smile is thin.

He drops his board to the floor and steps onto it, pushing off and away with a final wave over his shoulder.

He’s thankful for coolness of the air as he whips through it; it keeps him grounded even as his thoughts wander. The route to Sander’s house is a nice one, full of parks and cute-looking houses and it’s so familiar Robbe doesn’t really have to think. He could get to Sander house without help from anywhere in Antwerp. Sander is his true north.

He gets off his skateboard when he’s not far away, hooking it under his arm and walking the rest of the distance. He doesn’t bother knocking, just grabs the spare key from under the second potted plant and opens the door. He doesn’t hear any other noises from inside the house and there is no car in the driveway, so Sander’s parents probably aren’t home. With no one else to greet, he beelines to Sander’s bedroom and discovers the door wide open.

Sander is standing with his back to him, his dresser open and clothes spilling over the edge of the drawer. He’s shirtless, the hard contours of his back tensing as he rummages around for a shirt. Robbe’s mouth turns dry.

“Hey,” Robbe says, determinedly keeping his eyes on Sander’s face as he turns around.

Sander smiles as he pulls a black shirt over his head, “Hey, figured you were on your way over.”

“Yeah, got sick of skating,” Robbe props his board against the wall and wanders fully into the room. He sits down on the edge of the bed, feeling suddenly exhausted.

Sander snorts, “Got sick of Moyo you mean.”

Robbe can’t share his amusement or even bring himself to agree. He’s so drained, so tired of life, he just wants to lie down and not get up for a while.

Sander, taking note of his silence, glances over at him. When he sees Robbe’s slouched posture and the fatigue written across his face, he frowns, concern crinkling between his eyebrows, “Are you okay?”

“I’m so tired,” Robbe says and he tries to make it sound chagrined rather than sad, but he doesn’t think he succeeds.

He doesn’t know when the feeling started, this feeling that life is too much. Every day it’s harder to drag himself out of bed, to breathe, to put on a smile for his parents and his friends. There are too many hours in the day and too many people to please and the weight of it all is threatening to snap his spine. 

Sander is the only person he doesn’t have to play pretend for. When he’s with Sander he unravels, like a knot being untied. With Sander he can just be. Sander is his only safe place. In Sander’s room with the paint mottled rug, the scent of lead pencils and Sander’s reassuring presence, Robbe lets the exhaustion pull at his shoulders and his mouth falls into a comfortable frown.

Sander studies him a little longer, eyes wide and understanding. He sits down next to Robbe on the bed and rests their shoulders together. Robbe leans gratefully into it, body slackening further, any fight left rushing out of him.

“I was going to work on a painting,” Sander gestures to a half-painted canvas on the easel in the corner of the room, “I can do that while you sleep. You look so tired Robbe.”

Robbe plays with his own fingers, unsure. He feels bad for coming all the way over here, just to sleep, but he’s fallen asleep in Sander’s bed hundreds of times. He and Sander have never felt the need to fill silences with talk; Sander knows when to be quiet and when to be still. He won’t hold it against him. The way Sander’s looking at him now, a little sad and a lot worried means that maybe Robbe getting some sleep would make them both feel better.

Robbe sighs and nods, and still sitting kicks off his sneakers, leaving them at foot of the bed. Sander stands to give him some space and Robbe sheds his jacket, ditching it on the floor.

Robbe shuffles up the bed and crawls beneath the covers. He finally feels the heavy grasp of sleep tugging him under and cool relief spreads through him. His eyes follow Sander as he moves around the room collecting tubes of paint and brushes speckled like eggs.

Robbe buries his face in the pillow. It smells like Sander, like musk and the woody scent of his shampoo. Distantly he hears the opening notes of some slow rock ballad drifting across the room, Sander’s stereo turned low.

He burrows deeper into the covers and the soft sound of Sander’s brush strokes and the low music lull him to sleep.

+++

Sander starts watching him more closely after that.

Robbe knows his concern is valid, but it’s unnerving. Robbe gets flustered under Sander’s gaze at the best of times and now it’s more often, more intense. He becomes hyperaware of the dark crescents cut crudely above his cheeks; he can feel Sander tracing them with his eyes when they’re close.

But Robbe can’t ignore how much Sander cares. He’s not pushing or prodding, he’s just waiting for Robbe to be ready to open up. And Robbe wants to, more than he ever has. With each passing day he feels his stress and frustration building up inside of him like a badly shaken soda can.

In the end it comes out a little and then all at once.

He and Sander walk side by side on the way back from a café Sander swears has the best and only acceptable coffee in Antwerp when Robbe’s phone buzzes.

And then it buzzes again. And again.

He knows it’s his mother without having to open it. She’s been doing this recently, sending him scripture full of pleas for forgiveness and fear of the wrath of God. It’s just a byproduct of her fear and paranoia, the voices in her head insistent that she has something to be afraid of, but still he can’t dismiss the texts like he should. The lines about sinners bury themselves in his brain and he plays them over and over to fill the hours he’s not sleeping.

He can feel his demeanor changing, the straightening of his spine and the hunching of his shoulders as he tries to hide his own unease.

Sander grasps his elbow to get his attention, “Robbe?”

Robbe shakes his head, looking determinedly ahead and continuing down the street. Sander sighs, but keeps up with him, walking more closely to Robbe than before so their arms keep brushing, a reassuring touch.

Sander lets Robbe stay silent as they finish the walk home, but it’s clear he’s not letting it go. He waits until Robbe closes Sander’s bedroom door with a click to finally bring it up. Robbe goes to stand at Sander’s window, staring out his front yard. Sander stays by the door, doesn’t come up and crowd him like he normally would, keeps a careful distance between them.

Sander asks, voice gentle as fallen leaves, “Robbe what’s going on?”

“My mama is sick.”

It feels different saying it out loud, like he’s released it and now it’s true. Before that thought existed only in his head— his father is in denial and his mother is too scared or maybe too ashamed to put a name to it.

Robbe turns to Sander, needs to see his face. Sander is calm and Robbe does his best to moor himself in the green of his eyes.

“Sick how?”

He won’t cry, he won’t.

“She- some days she just lays there and stares at nothing for hours.” He drops his gaze away, “Sometimes she screams and screams and screams and thinks people are out to get her, that there are people watching our house and listening to our conversations.”

He chances another look at Sander, but he looks sad now, so Robbe hastily fixes on a point over Sander’s shoulder instead.

“Some days she doesn’t recognize me.” His voice hitches, and he swallows several times, but no tears leave his eyes. He’s sick of crying. Sander approaches slowly, but pulls Robbe into his arms without hesitation. He sinks a hand into the curls at the back of Robbe’s head, soothing him.

“Okay, it’s okay,” Sander whispers, pressing his lips to Robbe’s hair and letting them rest there. Robbe squeezes his eyes shut tight and lets Sander hold him. Robbe takes a couple of deep breaths and steps back, but his fingers stay curled around Sander’s arms, unwilling to let him go.

Sander returns the touch and tugs Robbe with him to lie down on the bed and arranges them so they lay facing each other. Sander returns his hand to Robbe’s hair, playing shyly with the strands.

“How long has this been happening?”

“Since we were kids,” Robbe reveals, “but it’s been getting worse recently, and Dad won’t take her to see a doctor or anything.”

“Why?”

Robbe sighs, “I don’t know. He doesn’t want to admit that anything is actually wrong. He used to look after her more, but now he just stays at work or wherever the fuck he goes and hides when he comes home. I’m sure he checks on her himself sometimes, but he’s never around long.”

Robbe doesn’t have the energy to question him, doesn’t see him for long enough periods of time to corner him and ask anyway.

He isn’t sure he wants to know. Doesn’t think he can deal with whatever the answer is on top of everything else

Sander’s hand stills in his hair.

“Robbe,” his tone is sharp, “Are you looking after her by yourself?”

“Well yeah,” Robbe says, “Someone has to; she needs help.”

“You’re fifteen, I can’t fucking believe he’s making you deal with this on your own.” Sander looks furious and Robbe gets it, he does, he’s perpetually mad at his father, but fury looks wrong on Sander, hardens the pretty edges of his face. Robbe wants to reach out and smooth each angry wrinkle with his thumb. 

“It’s okay.”

“It’s not,” Sander insists, sitting up, rocking the bed, “We should tell my parents; they can help.”

Robbe shakes his head vehemently, “No, just let me deal with this okay?”

“Robbe what if you get hurt?”

“She’s not dangerous Sander, she’s just sick,” Robbe says fiercely, his own anger rising. He grips at the blanket beneath his hand and wills himself not to snap at Sander.

Sander’s face softens and his anger fades into sweetened sympathy.

“I’m sorry,” he says, “I’ll do whatever you want me to do, I’m just worried.”

“I know,” Robbe whispers, and releases his hold on the bed cover, nudging his hand into the space between them like a peace offering, “I promise if anything happens, I’ll come straight to you.”

Sander doesn’t reply, only lays his hand over the top of Robbe’s. He caresses it gently, swiping his thumb back and forth over the skin and then folds their hands around each other.

Robbe maps the way their fingers lace together, unintrusive and easy. It’s intimate. Sometimes Robbe forgets how intimate hand holding is, but he can’t help it, touching Sander is second nature, the two of them woven together until he can’t tell where one of them starts and the other one begins.

Robbe inches across the bed towards him, and tucks himself into Sander’s chest and closes his eyes.

He forgets about his mother and his father and his own sins.

Just for a moment.

+++

Somehow Jens gets himself a girlfriend and manages to keep her. Despite only transferring at the start of the semester, Jana has fit right in, making friends with a group of nice girls from their year and wrapping Jens tightly around her finger in a number of weeks. Robbe likes Jana, she’s sweet and unassuming, and she treats Robbe like a younger brother, which is her excuse for being so fucking nosy.

They’re sitting out in the courtyard, Jens and Jana kissing and Robbe on his phone trying desperately to ignore the disgusting public display of affection going on beside him. He’s texting Sander pleas for help and semi-dramatic selfies of him gagging. He giggles when Sander replies with an extremely overblown and gallant offer to ditch school and come save him.

He’s typing out a reply, still laughing when Jana asks, “Who’s making you smile like that? You have a secret girlfriend?”

Her smile is teasing, but suspicious, and Robbe shifts nervously in his seat.

Then Jens chuckles, “No, that’s his Sander face.”

Jana perks up, swinging her head between the two of them, “Sander? Who’s Sander?”

Jens points to Robbe’s phone. “His best friend, it’s that dude all over Robbe’s Instagram.”

Jana’s eyes light up in recognition, “Oh yeah, I wondered who he was. Why haven’t you brought him around to our parties?”

Robbe shrugs, “I dunno. He’s two years older, I wasn’t sure if he’d wanna go to fourth year parties, I go with him to his art school parties sometimes, but we usually spend time doing stuff together just us. He knows Jens and Moyo, though, so I can invite him to your next one if you want?”

“Yes! I can’t believe you’ve been hiding a best friend from me.” She shoves him in the arm, and he laughs,

“Okay I’ll ask him.”

He and Sander find themselves walking through the door to Jana’s house two weeks later.

It’s a smaller get together, well as small as a high school party can be, mostly kids from their grade and some from the years above, but that doesn’t mean it’s any less loud, with music blasting and raised voices.

Jana is already tipsy when they arrive, and she squeals when she sees them, rushing over with Jens just behind her and pulling them into a slightly uncomfortable joint hug.

“Robbe!” She pulls back and ruffles his hair and places a damp kiss on his cheek before turning to Sander, “And you must be Sander.”

“That’s what my parents named me,” He’s got his most charming smile on, and Robbe wonders with amusement if Sander is trying to make a good impression. As if anyone he meets wouldn’t fall in love with him on sight. 

Jens puts his hand out and pulls Sander into a brief hug, clapping a hand on his back. “Hey man, how’s it going?”

“I’m doing good, how are you?”

“Good, just trying to keep Jana from drinking herself to death.”

Jana swats him in the shoulder but then leans in for a kiss right after. Jens face softens and goes all mushy and he pecks her on the lips. The look Sander gives Robbe, wide-eyed and disbelieving, sends him into a fit of laughter that he tries unsuccessfully to cover with a cough.

“Anyway,” Jana says slipping her arm around Sander’s before Robbe can stop her and tugging him to the other side of the room, “we have to introduce you to everyone!”

Robbe lets out an exasperated sigh as Jana drags Sander away and Jens clasps his shoulder apologetically as they follow the two over to the rest of the group.

Sander is promptly introduced to Zoë, Luca and Amber. Jens passes Robbe a beer (Sander had already received a cup of something strong, thrust eagerly into his hand by Jana), giving Robbe something to do while Sander talks to the rest of the group. Moyo must be somewhere else in the house, and Robbe is secretly grateful—he doesn’t think Sander would be very welcoming.

To Robbe’s annoyance, after a couple of minutes talking to the girls, Jana takes Sander to greet the Blonde Ambition girls where they’re huddled in a corner sipping on cups of cheap wine. Robbe doesn’t like the way their eyes trail Sander up and down, flirty and curious. Robbe looks away but keeps letting his gaze be drawn back to the little scene. Sander lips are crooked in that cute half-grin that shows he’s listening, Robbe wonders what those girls could be talking about that’s possibly worth listening to. Sander says something and they all laugh, tossing their long hair back over their shoulders. Robbe attempts to stifle the jealousy stirring to life in his stomach, takes a long sip of his beer and wills himself not to intervene.

He jumps into a discussion with Zoë to try and distract himself, nods idly along as she talks about her roommates and how they’ve been driving her crazy. He tries to pay attention, asks questions and hums at her anecdotes, but Sander’s deep mellow voice keeps drifting over to him. Robbe feels the pulls towards him, strong and impossible to ignore. He finishes the rest of his beer in one swallow and ditches the empty can on the nearby coffee table.

Robbe makes his excuses to Zoë and gives her an apologetic smile before stalking over to the group, latching onto Sanders arm and sending Jana a look of poorly concealed irritation.

“Thanks, Jana, can I have my best friend back now?”

Jana rolls her eyes. “If you must.”

Robbe gives her a sarcastic smile and leads Sander away, not returning to Robbe’s friends and instead steering him into an empty corner, where there are definitely no pretty blonde girls. 

Sander laughs, “I thought you wanted me to meet your school friends?”

His rosy cheeks hint at tipsiness, his original drink long gone and already replaced with something pink and fruity looking.

Robbe huffs, “I didn’t think I’d have to share you with everyone at the fucking party.”

“Awww are you jealous?” his tone is light and thick with teasing, but Robbe _is_ jealous, he wants Sander to himself, hates that he agreed to bring him to this dumb party in the first place.

“Yes,” Robbe says. Sander’s smile droops into something sweeter and more clandestine. Robbe thinks maybe he shouldn’t have made fun of Jens earlier for smiling like that. 

Sander scans around the room briefly and then looks back at Robbe. “I know we just got here but do you want to sneak off for a smoke?”

“Yeah, please.”

Robbe navigates since he knows his way around Jana’s house and outside. They slink out a side door and sit down side by side on the step. Sander sets his drink aside to pull a little tin out of his leather jacket pocket and starts rolling a joint for them to share.

Robbe tilts his head back and looks longingly at the sky. It’s a cold night— he can feel the bitter air slipping into the cuffs of his jacket—but it’s so pretty, and the cold pinching at his skin makes it more real somehow. It’s more difficult to see the stars at Jana’s house, closer to the inner city, but they’re still mostly there, white pinpricks punching little holes in the sky.

He looks back at Sander just in time to see him lick a tantalizing stripe along the paper and Robbe is once again thankful for the cold and how it prevents the heat from spilling up his neck.

Sander seals it and reaches back into his pocket for a lighter.

He cups his hand around the joint as he lights it, letting the small flame warm his hand. He takes a pull and lets the smoke curl upwards and vanish into the air. Robbe shuffles closer under the guise of reaching for the joint, wiggling until their thighs are pressed together unnecessarily, but Sander doesn’t call him out on it. He just hands Robbe the joint and watches him put it to his lips.

“Jana seems cool.”

Robbe exhales, “Yeah, she is. She’s good for Jens; he doesn’t act like such a dumbass when she’s around.”

“Wow, miracles can happen,” Sander says, voice full of faux amazement.

Robbe snickers breathily, “Shut up.”

They pass the joint back and forth between them in silence for a while, listening to the dull music still thumping through to them from inside and the muddled voices breaking between the beats at odd moments. It’s nice, not as good as him and Sander alone, lying beside each other on the floor brushing their fingers together where there’s no one to see them, but still nice.

“Hey, Robbe?”

“Yeah?” Robbe looks at him.

Sander’s face is pale under the moonlight, almost translucent. “You don’t have to share me with anyone.”

Robbe rests his head on Sander’s shoulder so he can’t see his smile. “Good.”

+++

Robbe feels a presence hovering over him, blocking the light from the ceiling.

It’d be disconcerting, if he didn’t know exactly who it is.

He opens his eyes, giving Sander a bemused look.

Sander is above him, forearms braced on either side of Robbe’s shoulders, holding himself up on the bed.

Robbe just blinks up at him, waiting for some kind of explanation.

“I wanna show you something,” Sander says, his smile big and infectious.

Robbe giggles, “Okay?”

Sander scrambles off his bed and goes to his desk to grab his phone and a pair of headphones. Robbe waits for him, adoration threatening to split him at the seams.

Sander climbs back up next to him, pressing as close as possible, so close that Robbe can’t take a breath in without catching the crisp scent of Sander’s deodorant.

He hands Robbe an earbud and starts scrolling through his Spotify playlists. He finds whatever he’s looking for and settles back against the pillows, knocking his head softly against Robbe’s.

After a moment, a strange melody streams gently into his ear. It’s slow but also somehow not, smooth but also disjointed. A careful kind of mess. And it’s weird, to think that something Robbe hasn’t heard before can remind him of Sander, but it does, like he’s heard it in a dream and is only just now remembering.

“Who is this?” Robbe asks.

“David Bowie,” there’s so much awe in Sander’s voice as he says it, he sounds almost childlike in his wonder. “He’s the greatest musician to have ever lived, Robbe. All the biggest stars, Freddie Mercury, Mick Jagger, wanted to be in the studio with Bowie.”

Sander is reverent as he continues, “And he was a mime, a singer who’s a mime, how crazy is that?”

“Crazy,” Robbe murmurs on a laugh that’s dripping with adoration. Sander is so fucking cute, so passionate and unafraid of sharing it, trusts Robbe to take him seriously and to share in his excitement.

“I’ve listened to every album, but this is my favourite, _The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders from Mars._ ”

It’s not anything like what Robbe normally listens to, but with Sander lying beside him, singing all the words under his breath Robbe can buy into the magic of it. It sounds sad, but so full of hope and Robbe never thought a song could sound like that, so wonderfully at odds with itself. He likes it more than he thought he would, but maybe that’s just because it’s Sander and he could never hate something Sander loves. 

**_“There’s a starman, waiting in the sky…”_ **

****

Robbe smiles, it’s perfect, unbelievably fitting. From the very first time they met he’s thought Sander must be made of stars, brilliant, beautiful and untouchable. His starman. He thinks about saying it to Sander just to hear him laugh, but it’s too private a thought, sappy and sentimental.

Instead, he hooks their pinkies together and lets the music flow over him as the songs phase from one to another. It’s a lot, strangely profound and Robbe isn’t sure how to feel. He glances over at Sander and sees how his eyes are transparent, his amazement and joy and lingering sadness laid out bare for Robbe to see. Robbe gets the feeling that this is Sander baring his soul, using the music to explain something he couldn’t or didn’t want to explain himself. 

He doesn’t know how long they lie there, listening, but Robbe feels the night chill pinch at his fingers. Robbe picks up Sander’s phone from where it’s laying by their heads and taps it to see the time.

“It’s 3 am,” he remarks and though he knows sleep won’t come for him, maybe Sander will be luckier.

“I didn’t even notice,” Sander says, and he doesn’t make any effort to get up.

“Should we go to bed?”

“M’not tired,” Sander dismisses, “The night is still young, I want to stay up and learn all the lyrics.” He turns his head to the side to look Robbe in the eyes, “but you don’t have to stay up with me, you can sleep, I don’t mind.”

Robbe looks at him for a moment but then shakes his head and doesn’t move.

They sit there and listen to the album over and over, until the words have sunk into Robbe’s brain and the melodies are as familiar as breathing, until the sky washes from black to blue and the first tell-tale bird noises titter on the morning air.

+++

Robbe is still wide awake when the knock on his window comes.

He sits up fast, and sees Sander standing on the other side of the window. He waves cheekily, face lit by the warm yellow light from Robbe’s desk lamp.

Robbe leans over the bedside table and checks the time on his phone, _22:13_.

He slips out from under his sheets and pads to the window, sliding it up and steps back, but Sander doesn’t climb inside.

Sander is dressed in all black and Robbe can just see the edge of the handlebar of his bike where it’s presumably propped against the side of the house. He doesn’t have the bag which he sometimes brings when he intends to sleep over. He’s looking at Robbe with an expectant expression, rocking back on the heels of his boots.

“What?” Robbe asks. Sander has come and dragged him on random adventures dozens of times, but unless it’s a party or a concert or something it’s not usually this late. And there’s just something in his air tonight that’s different, it promises rebellion and that specific type of mischief that only suits Sander.

“You’re going to have to get changed,” Sander says, eyes dancing.

Robbe glances down at his long t-shirt and boxers, “Why?”

“We’re going out,” Sander says, voice straining with barely contained amusement.

“What, Sander—”

“Come on Robbe, let’s go.” It isn’t a demand, but he knows Robbe won’t argue. 

Robbe sighs like he’s annoyed, but there’s an eager kind of energy trilling up fingertips as he turns towards his closet. He shucks on the first pair of jeans he finds and slips his orange jacket over his shoulders. He stuffs his feet into his sneakers and takes Sander’s hand as he helps him over the ledge.

Sander helps him sneak his bike out through the back gate before he mounts his own, and with an impish smile calls, “Come!”

“Where are we going?” Robbe yells after him.

“Don’t ask questions, just come on!”

They cycle through the unevenly paved streets, steering their bikes too close together and knocking each other askew, laughing loudly as they try to right themselves. Robbe is sure Sander is trying to distract him from working out their destination, pointing out stores and bars he’s been to or wants to take Robbe when he turns sixteen. Robbe barely notices when they’ve made it halfway across the city.

They race through the St Annas tunnel, their shouts whipping behind them like kites, echoing off the tiled walls. When they make it out the other side Sander leads them into unknown territory.

Robbe doesn’t recognise any of the landmarks around them, but they could just be disguised under the shade of night. Sander must know where they are because he pulls to a sudden stop in front of a large building with a heavy-looking door set in the front. It’s so dark on this side of the road and Robbe casts a forlorn look at the street lights a short distance away.

Sander hops off his bike throwing it carelessly into a bush beside the door, the back wheel still spinning absently. Robbe follows as quickly as he can, stumbling in his attempt to keep up. Sander is busy fiddling with a big door, jiggling at the handle.

“Sander, where are we?”

Sander looks back over his shoulder at him, eyes twinkling, “You’ll see.”

“What are you—”

“Shhhhh,” Sander hushes, turning his full attention to fucking with the door handle. After a little more struggling Robbe hears a soft click and Sander swings the door open, the look on his face positively gleeful. “Come.”

Robbe follows because of course he does, curiosity winding up his spine. It’s black inside the short hall, and they climb a small flight of stairs in the darkness. Robbe catches sight of a faint blue glow and Sander is practically vibrating with excitement.

They emerge and Sander spreads his arms wide as Robbe looks on in awe, the crystal blue water spread out before them.

“Woah,” Robbe breathes. It is a stunning sight, the endless deep blue and the cold mist swirling over the surface of the water like ghostly will-o’-wisps.

He’s so distracted by the beauty of it he doesn’t realise Sander’s stripping until he’s already got his jacket off and his shirt halfway over his head.

“Sander, what are you doing?”

Sander smirks at him, trying to pull his boot off his foot with both hands. “What does it look like?”

He gets both shoes off and starts working on the button of his jeans. Robbe’s brain short-circuits, and he watches Sander strip for far too long to be polite before he pulls himself together. 

“It’s fucking freezing!” Robbe says, half-incredulous half-whining.

“So? Come on.” He nods towards the water and shoves his jeans down his legs, his socks dragged off with them. Robbe kicks his shoes and socks off, and rids himself of his jacket, but the cold is already slipping beneath his shirt making him regret it.

“No way,” he announces, shaking his head vehemently.

Sander tosses him a wicked grin, shoves his briefs down, and throws himself into the water with a loud whoop and Robbe stares after him.

Sander surfaces, still grinning, and treads the water, “Come on, get in. All the way or no way.”

With an overwhelming amount of reluctance Robbe tears his shirt off and unbuckles his jeans, stepping out of them and kicking them aside. The pavers are rough against his bare feet, and the cold is already starting to nip at his toes.

He looks at Sander one last time, to stop himself from chickening out and shoves his underwear down and jumps.

Robbe plunges below the surface, is caught gently and time stills. His arms and legs and chest are bitten raw by the freezing water, but his blood feels hot where it’s racing through his veins.

He keeps his eyes closed for a moment listens only to the water bending around him before he opens them. Sander is floating in front of him, his eyes opalescent in the blue. He looks ethereal like he’s been woven from space and time. His hair tangles around his head like vines, he’s beautiful and so otherworldly Robbe’s heart stutters. Robbe is terrified to blink, scared that in an instant Sander will melt away, scatter among the stars never to be seen again.

It’s times like these where Robbe has the hardest time holding himself back. When Sander is so painfully beautiful, he seems like he couldn’t possibly be real. Even more incredible than that is the fact that he’s _Robbe’s_ , more than he’s anyone else’s. He’s Robbe’s best friend, Robbe’s person. He gets to see him almost every day, gets to rest his eyes on him for as long as he wants, gets to talk to him, gets to hear every fly-away thought he’s ever had. Sander is all his best memories, his happiest accidents, the boy of his dreams and all his waking moments too.

Sander looks back at him, fierce and intense, his focus shifting all over Robbe’s face like he’s trying to take all of him in at once but can’t quite manage it. Robbe knows if he wasn’t freezing, he’d blush.

Robbe stares at him until he runs out of air, shooting up and breaking through the water.

He hears Sander come up after him, taking deep strong breaths.

Robbe coughs and blinks water out of his eyes. He dips back under for a second, shaking his hair out of his face, slicking it away from his eyes.

Sander is still looking at him.

“What?” he asks, self-conscious.

“You’re so hot,” Sander muses.

Robbe furrows his eyebrows, “What—”

But he’s cut off when Sander presses his lips roughly against his own. It’s wet and messy and over far too soon. Robbe is dazed when they break apart. He can feel joy lighting him up from the inside, but it’s suddenly snuffed out by dread. Sander is animated and unpredictable and beautiful, but he’s never rough. He always touches Robbe tentative and soft, like he’s not quite sure he’s allowed. This isn’t that, this is something else. It’s Sander, but he’s slightly off.

Robbe can’t quite keep up with what just happened and before he can ask Sander is off again, “You’re so pretty Robbe, the prettiest boy in the world, I want to paint you, I mean I always do, but especially right now, the way the water is catching on your hair, lit up by the pool lights like a million shards of glass. We have to go; I need to get my supplies, paint or maybe charcoal.”

He starts swimming away, reaching for the ladder and climbing out of the pool.

“Sander—” Robbe scrambles after him, flailing in the water as he struggles to catch up. He still can’t process what’s going on. He follows Sander blindly, his brain trying desperately to pick up cues, to make sense of the situation, but he’s already ten steps behind.

He climbs out seconds after Sander, he stands in front of him, trying to find answers in his face. Fear licks at the corners of his mind.

Robbe can’t understand what he’s saying anymore, he catches every third word or so. Sander’s talking too fast, too nonsensical. Robbe reaches for his stuff, abandoned in a heap and starts tugging on his clothes as fast as he can, doesn’t want to take his eyes off Sander for too long.

The barest sense of familiarity tickles at the edge of Robbe’s consciousness. He’s fighting the urge to panic. He doesn’t know what’s happening right now, but something is clearly wrong. He has to keep Sander safe, and he’s afraid, he’s afraid of all the possibilities, the lateness of the hour, the distance to their homes, the cold-water pinning Robbe’s clothes to his skin. Sander is a wild card right now, and Robbe needs to stay in control, can’t let anything happen, but how can he prepare when he has no idea what’s going on?

Sander’s speech partially slows, enough for Robbe to make sense of it, “We should stay like this all the time don’t you think? It’s so freeing, people are meant to be naked anyway everyone else has to make it weird, but being naked is beautiful! Isn’t it Robbe?”

Sander’s eyes are wide and glassy. Robbe is so scared he can’t feel the cold anymore, but he reminds Sander of it anyway.

“Yeah, it is, but it’s really cold, we should put our clothes back on and go home, get warm,” Sander doesn’t notice the carefully composed tone of his voice, just keeps standing there, water dripping down his chest and his eyes flitting restlessly from side to side.

“Home! But we have so many places to go! We could go to the Meir! Or the skatepark! We could break into the museum! But we should eat, they have good burgers at the Meir! We could get burgers, but at home we could make croques! Home, that sounds good doesn’t it Robbe?”

“Yeah, croques sound good, let’s go home,” Robbe keeps his voice as level as he can, prays that it doesn’t waver. But Sander just smiles wide and to Robbe’s relief starts pulling his clothes on. Sander has been docile so far, open to suggestion, mostly just excited and high energy. Robbe hasn’t seen him scared or angry yet, doesn’t know if he can even get like that, or what it’ll look like if he does.

Robbe holds out Sander’s bike to him and Sander takes it once he’s pulled his jacket on, swinging his leg over the seat and cycling in loose circles as he waits for Robbe to do the same. There’s an aching kind of naivety to Sander just having fun, riding his bike. It’s a completely innocent action, but it’s somehow taken on a different meaning overnight and Sander is the only one who doesn’t know. Robbe hates that, feels like he’s almost lying to him and keeping secrets. Robbe is scared about how fast Sander will go, if he’ll veer off course, if he’ll be reckless or slow and Sander is blissfully unaware of it all.

Robbe doesn’t know how he gets Sander home. He doesn’t remember the journey to Sander’s house, and he doesn’t remember the subsequent trip with Sander’s parents to the hospital. The adrenaline he was running on that kept him focused has left him, he feels shaky and weak as they walk inside.

He only returns to himself when they step into the waiting room and the bitter sterile chemical smell fills his nose, shocking him out of his haze. Sander’s parents steer the two of them into some uncomfortable plastic seats and then walk away to a desk to start filling out forms.

Sander starts up a running commentary as his thoughts dance from one to another. Robbe keeps up the conversation as best he can, lets their chatter fill up the dark places in his brain where all the worst outcomes grow and fester. He thinks that maybe Sander was onto something with all those endless sad possibilities. Robbe feels like all the parallel universes lined up beside each other are pressing in on him. They aren’t amazing or fascinating, they aren’t anything but suffocating.

Robbe can feel himself getting antsy, he’s jiggling his leg so hard it’s shaking the chair. Mindlessly Sander reaches over and wraps their fingers together, squeezing Robbe’s hand lightly. Robbe squeezes back.

Sander hadn’t asked many questions about why they were at the hospital, accepting his parents calm reasoning that they just wanted to take Sander in to make sure everything was okay. He seemed confused, exclaiming that he felt great, amazing even, like he was ready to take on a hundred tasks, but hadn’t fought them when they asked him politely one more time to get checked out, just to make sure.

Sander’s parents return and draw away Sander’s attention, nodding interestedly as Sander talks and that allows Robbe to slip unnoticed into his own head. It’s funny, in the way that it’s not funny at all, that Robbe really thought the next time he’d be sitting in a hospital waiting room it’d be for his mother. It isn’t the same as his mother, it isn’t, but he loves them both so much the fear he’s feeling is achingly similar. 

He squeezes Sander’s hand a little harder.

A nurse comes up, her smile is jovial and kind as she says, “Sander? Would you and your parents come with me?”

Sander frowns, “What about Robbe?”

Robbe smiles softly. “It’s okay Sander, I’ll wait for you.”

“You promise you’ll stay?”

“Always.”

Seemingly satisfied, Sander stands, his hand slipping out of Robbe’s and coming to hang lonely at his side. His mother gives Robbe a reassuring smile, then puts a hand on Sander’s back, and they follow after the nurse down the hall. Sander’s father drops a quick kiss to Robbe’s head and murmurs, “We’ll be right back,” before joining them. Robbe’s eyes trail after them as they get further and further away.

When Sander disappears out of sight, Robbe slumps forward in his seat and starts to cry.

+++

It takes three days for Sander to crash 

After the psychiatrist had assessed that Sander wasn’t a danger to himself or others, they let his parents take him home. The mania can be concerning, they said, but as long as Sander isn’t putting himself in harm’s way there’s not too much to be afraid of.

Robbe doesn’t really know what happens after diagnosis. He knows there will be doctor’s appointments and prescriptions, there’s the number for a therapist tucked safely in Sander’s mum’s phone, and the promise of a cycle of highs and lows for the foreseeable future.

Robbe listened to what Sander’s parents were told by the doctors and he’s done a lot of googling, but he still feels so out of his depth. Then the manic episode ends, and the depressive episode begins.

The depression creeps up and slips into bed beside Sander, wraps its arms around him and pulls him down into the mattress. He only gets up to use the bathroom and he barely eats. Robbe feels his absence like a ghost, the hollow spaces in the house where his laughter used to live. Robbe misses the clatter of pans as he cooked in the kitchen and the clomp of his Doc Martens as he stepped in the door

At first, Robbe tries to sleep on the Driesen’s couch, but being away from Sander, not seeing or hearing him, makes Robbe restless and by the second or third night he’s migrated to Sander’s room and into his bed.

Sometimes Robbe curls up against him like a question mark, knees tucked behind Sander’s, catching brief snatches of sleep every now and then. Mostly he just lies awake and watches Sander sleep. Robbe needs to be close to him. To hold Sander, to feel his heart thudding through his shirt and know he’s there.

Sander doesn’t seem to mind his presence, but he hasn’t given any indication that he likes Robbe being there either.

He has his lips pressed to the back of Sander’s neck as he spoons him from behind. He can feel Sander’s chest rising and falling under his arm. Robbe feels stiflingly hot, his shirt pasted unpleasantly to Sander’s back, but he doesn’t have the heart to move.

Sander stirs and Robbe lifts his arm up to give him room to shift. Sander turns over, eyes already open, though heavyset and endlessly tired. His gaze travels over Robbe’s face, withdrawn and despondent.

He keeps his eyes on Robbe’s cheek as he says, “You should leave.”

It’s not a demand, it doesn’t sound like that’s what Sander wants. He says it like it’s a harsh truth.

“I’m not leaving,” Robbe asserts, quiet and firm.

“I’m just going to hurt you; I’m already hurting you.” He still won’t meet Robbe’s eyes.

“Hey, no you’re not.” He runs a hand through Sander’s hair, ignores the grease softening the tips of his fingers. “Right now, I’m just happy to be with you.”

“I don’t want you to worry about me, to think you have to look after me,” Sander croaks.

“I don’t think that, I love you. I want to be here.” He sends Sander a mischievous smile, “I just want to cuddle and take a nap.”

“That’s chill.”

Robbe giggles, “That’s chill.”

Robbe shuffles until Sander is cradled against his chest, head tucked into Robbe’s neck, their legs tangled under the covers. Despite the comfort it brings him, he can feel that Sander is tense, like he’s trying to hold it all together. That hurts Robbe’s heart more than anything else.

He wants to take it away, everything Sander is feeling, wants to make it better for him so badly.

Robbe is so, so tired and his voice is raspy and hoarse as he starts to sing, " _There's a starman, waiting in the sky, he'd like to come and meet us, but he thinks he'd blow our minds."_

He feels Sander laugh dryly against his chest, but it hiccups quickly into a broken sob and he starts to cry hard and unforgiving.

Robbe gains a new respect for David Bowie, the man who sings about love and pain and magic. Lying next to Sander and feeling this strange combination of happy-sad, he can understand finally how something so loud and raucous and full of life can still be so melancholy. How everything meaningful in life can be a bit of both. How someone as bright and beautiful as Sander can still hold so much sadness inside him.

Sander's tears are itchy against his throat, and Robbe knows he sounds like shit, but he doesn't stop singing, and when he finishes one song he moves onto another one, until Sander is breathing evenly, body heavy and eyes closed.

Robbe lays against him and thinks about the stars. How bright they burn, so that even as they're dying, they're exploding into supernovas.

+++

Robbe is accosted the second he walks through the school gates and into the courtyard. He could honestly not care less about school, but his father had finally picked up the call from the school saying Robbe had been skipping and he’d called Robbe, stressed and angry and demanded he go the next day.

Robbe didn’t argue with him, felt guilty for causing additional stress when things were hard enough for them as it is. So he left Sander’s the night before, kissing him gently on the forehead and accepting a Tupperware container of leftovers from Sander’s mother, and returned home.

“Where the fuck have you been?” Jens cries striding towards him, Moyo a couple of steps behind. “You’ve been MIA for, like, a week.”

Robbe bites his lip and contemplates what to tell them. He doesn’t think it’s his place to say, but he’s carrying enough secrets already, he doesn’t think he can handle the weight of another one. He’s too tired anyway to make up something convincing and he’s sure his worry is clear on his face.

Robbe sighs, running a hand through his hair, “With Sander, we had to take him to the hospital.”

Jens straightens. “What the fuck why?”

“He was manic. They diagnosed him with bipolar.”

“Fuck,” Jens says bluntly. Robbe nods in absent agreement.

“Yeah, and now he’s really down, so I’ve been staying with him. I didn’t see the point in coming to school; I would have spent the whole time worrying about him anyway.” He shrugs and has to adjust the strap of his backpack as it slips down his shoulder. 

“That’s rough, man,” Moyo remarks.

Robbe looks up at him hesitantly, “Yeah um it’s been a bit of a long week.”

Moyo nods, but he’s acting weird. He’s more soft-spoken, he’s looking at Robbe with what could only be described as empathy. He’s got his hands in his jacket pockets, like he’s trying to make himself smaller and less confrontational. 

“Are they putting him on medication? Lithium?” Moyo inquires.

Robbe pulls up short, confused at the specificity of the question.

“Uh yeah, I don’t remember exactly what and he hasn’t actually had the script filled yet but,” Robbe clears his throat, “How did you-?”

“My mother is bipolar,” Moyo says, uncharacteristically attentive.

“Is she—” Robbe stops and then continues tentatively, “Is she okay?”

“She’s great, she just has high periods and low periods sometimes, but she’s still the best mum in the world.”

Robbe swallows and nods but looks down hard at his feet. He didn’t realise he needed to hear that and the relief warming him up makes him light-headed.

“It’ll be okay Robbe, you’ve gotta chill out a bit, he’s just going through a hard time right now,” Moyo gives him a reassuring smile, “Your boy is gonna be fine.”

Robbe takes a quick breath then lets it out before he looks back, “I know.”

Jens swings an arm over his shoulder in a half-hug, “Come on let’s head in before the bell, Miss Maes has been on my ass and I don’t want to piss her off by being late.”

“You’re scared of some chick? That’s pathetic man,” Moyo laughs.

“I’m not _scared_ of her, some of us actually want to pass dickhead.”

They bicker all the way to the classroom and Robbe’s smile blooms like a flower breaking through the last winter snow.

+++

Sander comes back to himself slowly day by day.

Robbe takes Moyo’s advice, does he best not to overwhelm him, not to be to stifling, but every time he has to go back to his own house or leave for school, it feels like he’s left part of himself behind on Sander’s pillow.

They don't talk about how Sander kissed him when he was manic and maybe that's for the best. Sander never mentions it and Robbe doesn't know how to bring it up anyway. He isn't sure what he'd want Sander to say, so he doesn't ask. 

School is better than it’s ever been, and for the first time in a while Robbe doesn’t dread seeing his friends. Moyo seems to have dethawed, his usual attitude towards Robbe mellowed. Robbe is as unsettled by it as he is grateful, keeps waiting for Moyo to snap out of it, but he’s been lucky so far and he isn’t about to question it. 

But coming home to Sander is still the best part of his day. Wednesday, he slips into Sander’s room after finishing his half day. His heart swells at the sight of Sander sitting at his desk drawing on a worn looking pad. Robbe walks up behind him, letting out a low hum so Sander knows he’s there.

“Hey,” Robbe murmurs, slipping his tan jacket off his shoulders and hooking it over the back of Sander’s chair.

“Hey.” Sander pushes the notepad aside and tips his head back against Robbe’s stomach so he can look up at his face. His eyes are still lined with exhaustion and he has yet to crack a real smile, but Robbe notes the clean scent of his hair and the fresh bed sheets.

“What’ve you been up to?” Robbe asks.

“Just drawing, cleaning a bit.”

Robbe scratches at the base of Sander’s neck and Sander closes his eyes at the touch, “Are you hungry? Want me to make you some croques? Your mum said there was stuff in the fridge.”

Sander shakes his head. “Actually, can you do something for me?”

“Anything.”

Sander opens his eyes again and the emotion Robbe finds there throws him off guard. Sander looks sheepish, even embarrassed.

“I want you to help me bleach my hair,” he says finally.

The request is a little out of the blue, but it’s not that strange, Robbe doesn’t understand why it’s making Sander feel self-conscious.

“I mean, if you trust me that much, then sure.”

Sander doesn’t rise to the bait, just stands up slowly out of his chair and nods his head at the door.

“The stuff is already in the bathroom.” He walks into the hall and across to the bathroom. Robbe follows timidly. He’s always been able to read Sander, Sander is so open and expressive, Robbe isn’t used to him trying to hide his feelings and it’s almost hurtful though Robbe knows Sander doesn’t mean it to be.

Sander flicks on the only light in the small room and they work together to unpack the box dye, conditioner, and brushes, Robbe reading the instructions to himself as Sander sets out the equipment on the countertop. Sander ducks out to grab a chair from the kitchen.

Sander comes back and places the chair facing the mirror and sits down. Their eyes meet in the mirror and something heavy passes between them.

“Sander, why are we doing this?”

“I just want to be someone else for a while.” He sounds so defeated; it shreds Robbe’s heart inside his chest. 

He wants to smother Sander’s helplessness, snuff it out with love and tenderness, “I like you just like this.”

He settles his hand at the juncture of Sander shoulder, ghosts over the tendons of his neck, brushes sweetly at the skin behind his ear, until Sander is pliant and relieved, relaxing into the chair.

He presses a kiss to the crown of Sander’s head and pulls on the plastic gloves and gets to work. They don’t talk to each other, but Sander plays music out of his phone speakers as Robbe coats his hair in bleach.

They wait the allotted 20 minutes before rinsing it out in the shower and conditioning it thoroughly. Sander keeps his eyes closed as Robbe towel dries his hair nervously, half prepared for the hair to start dissolving beneath his fingers, but it seems he did a better job than he expected.

The strands dry quickly and ignite to bright white, made purely of starlight. Robbe runs the hair through his fingers, trying to make sense of it. 

Sander has always been striking to Robbe, but now undeniably so, tanned skin, pale hair and sad eyes. Sander is a walking dream.

Robbe halts the drying and the fiddling and Sander opens his eyes and catches sight of himself in the mirror.

For the first time in weeks Sander smiles.

Robbe exhales.

+++

Robbe watches the big metal roller door in trepidation.

“Robbe you can stop looking so suspicious it’s fine I promise,” Sander smirks.

Robbe scowls, he can’t help but be on edge, they’re out in the middle of nowhere at some huge shed that Sander claims he’s been to several times, but Robbe knows better than to trust the teasing smile on his face.

It’s hard to be too annoyed though, not when Sander looks like he does tonight. Wrapped in black from head to toe, dark and enticing, his white hair muted in the minimal light. Robbe keeps looking over at him, drinking him in, scared if he looks away too long Sander will evaporate into the night.

He tries not to flinch in nervousness as Sander knocks rhythmically on the door.

There’s a small click and then the door starts sliding up. When there’s enough of a gap they duck under and through.

It’s dark inside, shadows curving over the walls and up the sides of what look to be garbage trucks.

Robbe can make out a dozen or so masked people dipping in and out of patches of moonlight, spilling down through rusted gaps in the ceiling.

Sander reaches into his green duffle bag, deliberately avoiding jostling the camera sitting on his chest and hands Robbe a painter’s mask, taking one for himself and hooking the elastic over his ears. Robbe puts his own over his mouth and stays close to Sander’s side as they slink further into the space.

Robbe can hear the sound of metal clanking together coming from Sander’s bag as it swings at his side. Judging by the people standing at the sides of the garbage trucks shaking paint-spotted aerosol cans and misting bright pinks, blues, and oranges over the blank surface, it’s probably spray paint.

Before they can find their own section to work, a girl with short dark hair and a tote bag approaches and tugs her own mask down to call, “Sander!”

Sander pulls off his mask too and reveals his smile, he leans in and kisses her cheek lightly, “Hey, Noor.”

They draw apart and Noor’s gaze slides across to Robbe in curiosity.

“Robbe, this is Noor, she goes to my high school,” Sander introduces.

“Hey.” Robbe smiles.

“Hey.” Her eyes trace Robbe up and down with interest, and he hastily moves closer to Sander, who looks vaguely amused. Noor turns back to Sander. “So are you spraying tonight or just taking photos?”

“I’m finishing a piece tonight since the trucks are going out tomorrow, I brought Robbe along to see the final product.”

“Does Robbe spray?”

She looks even more interested now, but Sander just chuckles. “No, but I guess you could say he’s my muse.”

At that Noor’s expression morphs into polite confusion, but she smiles nonetheless. Robbe can tell Sander is getting antsy, his hands flexing towards the zip of his bag more often like he does whenever he wants to get to work on something. Robbe moves his hand down and tugs lightly at the cuff of Sander’s jacket to let him know they can go if he wants.

Sander turns apologetic, “Sorry to cut this short, but I really want to show Robbe what I’ve been working on, I’ll catch you at school?”

Noor’s eyes linger on Robbe for another second before she nods, “Yeah, see you later.”

Robbe starts moving away, walking a couple paces before he feels Sander fall into step beside him. Sander’s hand slips effortlessly into his own and Robbe looks up in surprise, but Sander isn’t even watching him. The move was subconscious and Robbe heart stops and then restarts at the thought. 

When Robbe glances back he sees Noor’s eyes resting where their hands are joined.

Robbe tucks his chin into his chest and tries to stop Sander from seeing the beaming smile breaking out across his face.

The space isn’t that big, and they don’t have very far to walk before Sander slows and leads Robbe up a set of mildly dangerous looking stairs. Once they reach the top platform Sander stops, releasing Robbe’s hand and dropping into a crouch.

Sander unhooks the camera from around his neck and holds it out for Robbe to take. Robbe slings it on as Sander unzips his duffel. He pulls out several spray cans, each with different coloured caps in tan, black, a pale peach, and other varying shades.

Looking to the surface of the truck, Sander has already painted the base colours and shapes, it just seems to lack any kind of defining details, which must be what he’s hoping to complete. It’s kind of hard to make out what it is.

Sander begins uncapping canisters and stands. The can makes a clacking sound he shakes it up. Robbe raises the camera to his eye, flipping it on as Sander had shown him how to ages ago. He doesn’t know what settings Sander has on and he doesn’t want to mess with it, so he simply aims and shoots, taking a couple of photos of Sander just standing, considering his next move and then takes more as he raises the can up and sprays a sharp line across the metal.

He’s so beautiful to watch, so much more serious than usual, his eyebrows lowered in concentration. Robbe feels safe hidden behind the camera, content to stare at Sander openly through the lens, taking photo after photo trying to catch every intricate expression on his face.

At one point their eyes lock, and Sander looks up at Robbe from under his lashes. “I think you have enough photos of me.”

Robbe blushes and drops the camera back to his chest, but Sander just unhooks his mask and grins letting him know he’s teasing and returns to his task. Robbe sits down on the top step and jerks his phone out of his jacket pocket. He listens contentedly to the hiss of the spray paint behind him as he scrolls mindlessly through his Instagram and waits for Sander to finish. 

After a long while Sander speaks up, “Okay it’s done, you can look.”

Robbe gets up, his legs aching in protest at being stuck in the same position for so long and moves to stand beside him. Sander is smiling encouragingly but there’s something else there, he’s almost shy. There’s a sweetness to it that makes Robbe feel fuzzy all over.

He finally turns his head towards the truck. Love flares in his chest, hot and unbridled. It’s a medium sized image of two hands, pulling reluctantly away from each other, thumbs hooked together, unwilling to let go. He can tell it’s them by the colour of the jacket sleeves, tan and black, him and Sander tied together and immortalised in paint, holding onto each other for infinity. Or at least until someone cleans the graffiti away.

“Sander, it’s amazing.” Robbe says his voice pitched low and sincere. He doesn’t dare look at Sander as he says it, too afraid of giving himself away.

“Yeah?”

“Yeah.” His eyes roam all over it, documenting every little line and stroke, the wrinkles in their jackets and the tendons pressed against the skin as they strain to hold on to each other.

This piece feels different, more special. Robbe is usually at the centre of Sander’s art. Sander must have thousands of pictures of Robbe by now, he knows (though it makes him blush) that there are whole sections of Sander’s art portfolio dedicated to him and photographs and sketches of him pinned over Sander’s desk. Robbe often finds little drawings of himself shoved between the pages of his schoolbooks and tucked into the pockets of his jacket. But Sander rarely draws himself, and to choose to have the both of them in a mural as well-thought-out and public as this feels significant. It sends a warm tingle running down Robbe’s neck. He wants to trace the image of their hands with his finger, would if the paint wasn’t still wet. Wants to take Sander’s hand again and bring the image to life.

“I’ve been working on it for a while,” Sander admits, “I started doing full body sketches for a class project but then I figured it would look so much better as a statement piece you know, one solid image of two hands clasped endlessly together. And I know our faces aren’t in it, but those are our hands, that’s us, as we are, and we have nothing to hide, you don’t need to see our faces to see that.”

Robbe nods dumbly and makes a little choked sound in the back of his throat. He’s so taken aback by the sentiment of it all. It’s how Sander sees them, their relationship, how close their souls are intertwined. It’s clear in the picture, who they are, how much they care about each other. It’s beautiful.

“I love it.” And though Robbe can’t see it behind his mask, he can tell Sander is smiling. Robbe wonders if he’ll see that truck driving around Antwerp in the coming days, if someone will take a picture of it, if he’ll get to see Sander’s mural again. He draws the camera back to his eyes and snaps several pictures, angling around, determined to capture it properly so they can have a copy of it forever.

He’s distracted when Sander starts moving again, leaning down to clean up his supplies, shoving the cans back inside his bag.

“We should go,” he says reluctantly, swinging his bag up over his shoulder.

Robbe mumbles his agreement, taking one last long look at the mural before he trades Sander back his camera and they climb back down the steps.

They leave with a little wave goodbye to Noor walking back out into the night and find where they hid their bikes in a nearby bush, ditching their masks along the way.

“Come on,” Sander hovers over the bike seat, one foot poised on the pedal, “I’ll ride with you all the way home.”

“All the way to my house?”

“I’m feeling gentlemanly. Want to drop you off at the doorstep and say goodnight.” Sander flutters his eyelashes at him.

Robbe rolls his eyes and starts pedalling away. “Sure okay.”

“Hey!” Sander calls from behind, “I’ll get my license in April and then I’ll get to chauffeur us around.”

“So you’ll drive me to school?” Robbe asks innocently

“Don’t push your luck, IJzermans.”

They trade jibes back and forth the rest of the way home, until they skid to a stop in front of Robbe’s front door.

It’s quiet on his street, not that it’s normally loud, but something feels off. It feels emptier somehow. Robbe searches his front yard, trying to place what’s different when he notices their car is gone from the driveway.

A brick settles uncomfortably in Robbe’s stomach. It’s very late, and even his mostly absent father is always home by this time, there’s no reason for the car to be gone. He feels apprehension tingle across his shoulders and up his neck.

He feels Sander shift towards him, feeding off Robbe’s anxious energy.

“What is it?” Sander asks.

Robbe shivers. “The car’s gone.”

Robbe abandons his bike at the top of the driveway and Sander does the same, mirroring Robbe’s every move, a protective presence.

He drags his feet to the front door and Sander follows both of them adopting a tense silence. Robbe twists gingerly at the handle, it immediately gives way under his hand, unlocked and opens. Robbe swallows a lump in his throat, his pulse spiking.

Robbe edges inside, Sander right on his heels, pushing the door closed behind them with a deafening click. The entrance area looks normal, there’s nothing where it shouldn’t be, no obvious signs of danger. They follow the natural path to the kitchen and stop dead.

The overhead cupboards are dangling open, their contents gone. His grandmother’s china is sprinkled across the floor like stardust, their plates and bowls smashed into tiny pieces.

Fear seizes in his chest and he sprints for his parents’ bedroom. He hears Sander’s footsteps pick-up behind him. Flying down the hallway, he shoves the door open and tumbles into the room and Sander rushes in after him.

Robbe’s mother is curled up on the bed on top of the sheets, fast asleep. Robbe treads closer and sees some little spots dotted up her legs where the broken plates must have nicked her skin, but other than that she’s okay. Robbe is dizzy with relief.

He turns back to look at Sander, a hundred questions in his eyes. How did this happen? Where is his dad? Did this even happen while he was here? He steps back from the bed and glances around as if the room will tell him what happened. That’s when he notices the closet.

The door is wide open and there are clothes spilling pitifully out, some dropped haphazardly on the floor. Robbe looks closer, sees his mother’s unworn dresses hung perfectly on their hangers, her work shirts folded in neat stacks. His father’s shirts are missing, his ties and socks and underwear pulled from their draws. His shoes no longer rest by the door.

Robbe knows that if he walks into the study his father’s laptop won’t be there and his work papers will be missing, there’s only random traces of him left throughout the house. Everything hits Robbe at once like a tumbling wave, despair, rage, fear, disgust. He’s a coward, he’s a fucking coward and Robbe hates him, he hates him so much.

His father is gone and he’s not coming back.

+++

**Author's Note:**

> thank you for reading!
> 
> comments are lovely and i try to reply to them all
> 
> you can follow me on tumblr @honeyandsinn


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